


(you owe me) Ten Seconds

by maybehonestly



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Human, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Case Fic, Crimes & Criminals, Fast and the Furious series - Freeform, Found Family, M/M, Minor Allison Argent/Scott McCall, Past Kate Argent/Derek Hale, Street Racing, Undercover Cop Stiles Stilinski, cop!Stiles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-08
Updated: 2015-07-08
Packaged: 2018-04-08 07:29:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4295994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maybehonestly/pseuds/maybehonestly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Wait, so can I race?” Stiles asks.</p><p>“I don’t know, can you?” Scott replies over his shoulder as he heads back into the garage.</p><p>Stiles laughs and gets in his Jeep before Isaac is tempted to come back for another hit. Scott McCall is absolutely nothing like Stiles thought he was going to be. He’s supposed to be the leader of the Pack, but he just seems really friendly and protective.</p><p>Derek on the other hand- well, Derek is complicated. And so far Stiles’ best in. It has nothing to do with how intrigued Stiles is by him or with how much he wants to sleep with him. Nope. Nothing at all. </p><p>(A Fast and Furious AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	(you owe me) Ten Seconds

**Author's Note:**

> Here is my fic for the Sterek Haven Big Bang! It's a loose adaptation of the first Fast and Furious movie with Stiles as Brian and Derek as well... if I told you I'd ruin some of the surprise :) 
> 
> For fair warning, the violence is about on par with the first movie which I would say is less violent than any given episode of Teen Wolf. And no one dies. 
> 
> I wouldn't have been able to do it without my absolutely amazing and wonderful beta [Neon](http://www.knoxyd.tumblr.com). Also many thanks to [Kuri](http://www.authorkurikuri.tumblr.com) for making the fantastic art that you can find on her tumblr.
> 
> You can find me over at [my tumblr](http://www.maybehonestly.tumblr.com) where I sometimes write and I sometimes gif and I'm almost always sarcastic and definitely always swearing.

Stiles pulls up to the curb across from the janky garage with a small restaurant connected to it. From the little he already knows he assumes Erica must have flirted with the licenser to get the “A” rating. 

He’s only had one thing on their ‘menu’ and he certainly isn’t about to try anything else at the Hale garage and risk getting the food poisoning he knows he would. 

The place is quiet today even though it frequently isn’t. As he approaches he can see a couple people in the back, but the only person out front is Derek Hale. Derek, who looks bored out of his mind, but still smirks a little when he sees Stiles coming. 

“Back again?” Derek drawls. 

“Best sandwich around,” Stiles replies jauntily.

Derek rolls his eyes. “You and I both know that isn’t true.” 

Stiles shrugs and takes his seat on a stool across the bar from Derek. 

Stiles tries to see what’s going on in the back without being too obvious about it, but Derek quickly blocks his view when he steps into Stiles’ line of vision and drops the plate with the tuna sandwich in front of him. 

“That’s your best customer service?” Stiles teases.

“Eat your fucking sandwich and shut up, Stiles,” Derek replies with a lift of his eyebrows.

“Aw, Derek, you should know I never shut up. At least not unless I’m properly persuaded.”

Stiles obscenely shoves his tongue against the side of his cheek, and Derek’s smirk grows. 

“I could persuade you,” a voice menaces from behind Stiles. 

Stiles quickly whips around to find the rest of the crew approaching. He should’ve heard them before it got to be too late. He needs to focus. 

“Isaac-“ Derek starts, but is quickly cut off.

“This kid’s here way too much. I don’t like it,” Isaac says as he approaches Stiles.

Stiles drops some cash on the counter and backs away. “I’m not trying to cause any trouble. I’ll leave. See you soon, Derek.” Stiles can’t resist throwing a wink in his direction as he walks out. 

He knows it wasn’t the right move as soon as he hears Isaac follow him out of the garage.

“Hey,” Isaac yells.

Stiles turns around, but before he can say anything, Isaac shoves him against his Jeep, hard. Stiles shakes off the hit and quickly punches Isaac back. Isaac has a good six inches on him though so the tides quickly go in Isaac’s favor.

Stiles thinks he can hear yelling, but everything’s going a little funny from the beating he’s taking. Thankfully, Isaac is hauled off of him before he actually can do too much permanent damage. 

“Walk away,” Scott says as he pushes Isaac back and offers a hand to help Stiles up.

“You have to find this at least a little suspicious,” Isaac protests.

Scott considers Stiles carefully and shrugs like he has a point. “No one actually likes the tuna,” Scott says like he’s teasing, but Stiles can tell he isn’t. 

Stiles is well-aware how he has to play this right if he wants to keep his life and keep his chances alive. He glances to where he can see Derek casually leaning against the side of the garage before looking back at Scott. 

“I’m not here for the tuna.”

“See,” Isaac says and moves back towards Stiles intimidatingly. 

“I want to race.” 

No one says anything for a moment until Erica barks out a laugh and says, “In that thing?” as she gestures towards his beat-up but well-loved Jeep. 

“I keep this for sentimental reasons. My racing car is elsewhere.” Stiles pats his car fondly. 

Scott watches him and turns around without another word.

“Wait, so can I race?” Stiles asks.

“I don’t know, can you?” Scott replies over his shoulder as he heads back into the garage. 

Stiles laughs and gets in his Jeep before Isaac is tempted to come back for another hit. Scott McCall is absolutely nothing like Stiles thought he was going to be. He’s supposed to be the leader of the Pack, but he just seems really friendly and protective. 

Derek on the other hand- well, Derek is complicated. And so far Stiles’ best in. It has nothing to do with how intrigued Stiles is by him or with how much he wants to sleep with him. Nope. Nothing at all. 

\--

Stiles walks into his childhood home and is once again amazed by how little has changed since he’s been back last. It seems like there’s more and more time in between every visit here. It’s not always on purpose and sometimes it isn’t even his choice, but nevertheless, it’s now been weeks since he’s seen his dad and months since he’s been here. 

“Dad?” Stiles calls out.

His dad quickly rounds the corner and pulls him into a crushing hug. 

“Wow, you act like you haven’t seen me in years.”

John slaps Stiles across the back of his head as he pulls away. 

“You and I both know how dangerous what you’re doing is. If anyone was to find out, you’d be dead before we’d even know you’d need saving.”

Stiles winces. He knows his dad is right, but going undercover always requires a certain level of disillusionment from the truth; otherwise you’d go insane trying to balance everything. 

“I know, dad. Sorry.”

“I just want you to get home safely at the end of all of this. The McCall gang is renowned for their harshness, and I don’t need you to be another cop on their list.”

Stiles barks out a tiny laugh before he can stop himself.

“What’s so funny?” The Sheriff asks. 

Stiles plops down on the sofa. “I met Scott today and he honestly doesn’t seem that bad.”

John sits down across from him and takes a deep breath. “I know you know what you’re doing, but I also know you.” 

Stiles tries to interrupt, but John quickly stops him. “You’re still my kid and that means I know how reckless you can be. The only reason we put you undercover was because one of the gangs has started killing during their hijackings and we need to figure out who it is. This means they will kill you if they find out who you are.”

Stiles nods to show his dad he gets it, but he also knows he can’t think like that or he will end up killed. “I know all that, dad, I really do. But if I think about that then they’ll find out, I have to think of them like I want to join them which means I can’t think of my possible demise at their hands. I can only think about how much I want to be them.”

John sighs heavily, stands up, and returns just a couple moments later with two beers. “You always were better at the undercover game than I was.” 

“That’s why you’re the boss, and I’m doing the grunt work,” Stiles replies. John smiles at him.

“Just promise me-“

“I’ll be as safe as I can.”

John nods. Neither one of them is under the belief that what Stiles is doing is safe, but as long as he’s aware, there’s a better chance he makes it home. 

“Well, actually, about that-“

“Stiles,” John warns.

“I need a car. A really, really fast car.” 

John closes his eyes and leans his head against the back of the chair. “I need another beer.”

Stiles listens to his dad for once even though he really shouldn’t be condoning this behavior. For how much he’s about to cost the precinct though, he can kind of understand it. 

\--

Stiles parks his car among the sea of tricked out vehicles in the brightest colors imaginable. He’s seen footage of one of the races before, but this is the first time he’s ever been front and center in the action. Literally, if everything goes to plan. He’s not set to race, but with the time he spent on this car the past couple of days he hopes it’s enough to impress Scott. 

He gets out of his car and immediately feels out of place. He certainly isn’t dressed like the rest of the normal racers with his plaid button down over his beloved Star Wars shirt. 

He tries to act like he belongs, but he knows he doesn’t. He’s been faking it until he makes it for years though and it’s not going to change now.

He’s so distracted by his environment that he doesn’t notice a girl popping his hood open until it’s way too late to stop her. 

“Hey! What do you think you’re doing?” Stiles asks as he steps towards the girl. 

He doesn’t get far before a large man steps in his path. He quickly mentally catalogues the girl as Malia Tate, another more recent member of Scott’s gang, which then must make the man in front of him Boyd, but he can’t know for sure since they have no pictures of him. 

The McCall gang has done a remarkable job of keeping their faces away from cameras. Stiles’ undercover position allows them access like the precinct never could have dreamed. 

Stiles holds both hands up and backs away slowly. Boyd stares blankly at Stiles, but he seems more amused by everything than seriously considering Stiles as a threat. 

Stiles can’t decide if he finds that insulting or reassuring. 

Malia’s still digging around in his car so Stiles decides to play it up in hopes that it works in his favor. “Like what you see?”

Malia glances at him before turning back to the car. 

“It’s all me,” Stiles says as he nudges Boyd, but he quickly flails away when Boyd glares angrily at him. “Sorry, won’t happen again.”

“Don’t worry about him,” Malia says as she drops the hood of the car back down. “He’s just a giant teddy bear.” She bumps her hip against Boyd’s and receives what Stiles thinks is a small smile in return. 

She stalks closer to Stiles until she has him backed against his car. “I’ll admit, I’m impressed. You know your stuff. But you’re still leagues below Lydia in terms of tech enhancements if that’s what you’re trying to offer.” 

She spins away and hops up to sit on his car. 

“But then again, we’re all still trying to figure out if this is just some elaborate ruse to sleep with one of us, which for some of us is completely not necessary,” she says into his ear as she leans in, but then quickly pulls back. 

“And for others-“ He watches her eyes dart to where the crowd quickly parts for Scott and Derek to walk through. “Is never going to happen.” 

Scott walks over to where Stiles and Malia are still leaning against the car while Derek stops next to Boyd who has moved away from the pair. 

“Malia?” Scott asks.

“I mean, it’s a car,” she replies before kissing him on his cheek and strutting away. 

“She, I mean- I can show-“ Stiles sputters. They had little information on Malia or Boyd and he’s immediately regretting not trying to find out more about them. 

Malia’s a curveball he wasn’t anticipating and he hates not being able to anticipate his problems. 

Scott claps him on the shoulder and laughs. “Don’t worry, that’s her way of saying your specs are good.”

Stiles lets out a visible sigh of relief.

“You really want to race that bad?” Scott asks with a grin.

Stiles nods.

“How much?” 

Stiles takes a deep breath and sends a prayer heavenward that his dad won’t kill him. “I win. I get your respect.”

Scott chuckles, but none of it seems mean hearted. “And if you don’t?”

Stiles pulls his pink slip out of his pocket and holds it out with Scott to see. “You get my car.” 

Instantly, Stiles knows that did the trick because Scott seems thoroughly impressed. 

“You’re crazy, but if you want to give me your car, that’s your prerogative. I promise to not mock you too hard when you’re crying after the race though,” Scott says as he walks away. 

Stiles isn’t worried. He knows he’s faster than nearly any other person out here. He also knows he can take Scott. He’s studied how he races and he knows how to beat him. 

\--

Stiles spoke too soon. Of course, Stiles spoke too soon. If this job has shown him anything, it’s how thoroughly underprepared he’s been no matter what he does. He’s also completely and totally fucked. Because he may know exactly how Scott races, but as soon as he pulls up to the line, he realizes he isn’t racing Scott.

No, not Scott, instead he’s racing Derek. Who he didn’t even know raced anymore. Thus why he’s absolutely fucked. 

Of course, he only finds this out after he’s pulled to the line to find Derek in the car next to him. From what he knows, he’s pretty sure Braeden from the Alpha gang is on Derek’s other side and Jackson Whittemore of the Argents is on Stiles’ other side.

Jackson’s one of the only Argent members who keeps a public profile. The only other one that frequently shows her face is the current leader’s daughter, Allison. Everyone else remains firmly hidden. 

Stiles can’t help but to glance to Derek to find him looking right back. 

“Nervous?” Derek teases. 

“Nah, not at all,” Stiles replies, “I didn’t know you raced.”

“Thought I lived to make you tuna sandwiches?” 

Stiles rolls his eyes. “It did seem like your true calling.”

Derek laughs sarcastically. “That’s really funny. It’ll be even funnier when you’re giving me your car approximately three minutes from now.”

“I’m not worried.” 

“Unless you’ve got some magical force coming to help you out, I would be,” Derek replies with a raise of the eyebrows. 

Damn the cocky asshole. 

Stiles can’t help but to laugh because Derek’s the first person who hasn’t looked completely lost by Stiles’ shirt. In fact, he seems to like it. 

“Who says I don’t?” Stiles teases. He glances down to his NOS, which is rigged up and ready to go. He also hopes some force does help him because he’s going to need it now that he’s racing blind. 

“We’ll see,” Derek says, but then turns his eyes forward as Malia walks out to begin the race. 

“Dicks and cunts! Are you ready?” she yells. The crowd cheers. “Racers?” They all move forward to the true starting line.

Stiles winces when he rolls past and has to reverse to get back to the line. He can see Derek smirking out of his peripheral vision. 

He tries to ignore that though. He needs to block everything out if he has any chance of winning. He barely notices as Malia raises her arms and drops the flag as he slams on the gas. 

He’s on pace with Jackson, but Braeden and Derek are a car’s length in front of him or maybe even a little more in Derek’s case. 

He glances at the NOS, but instead swings in just enough to get an edge over Jackson and put Braeden in range. 

He knows they only have maybe a mile left and he thinks that if he does it now, he won’t blow his car and he should be able to take the lead. 

He presses the button for the NOS and increases the gap between him and Jackson as well as putting him a hair in front of Braeden. 

However, Derek is still ahead of him.

“Fuck it,” Stiles says as he presses the button again. His car lurches forward slamming him back against the seat. It takes everything in his power to keep his car on a straight path. He can hear something popping and falling off, but he thinks he can see the finish line.

He’s just passed Derek and risks a glance over at him only to find him zooming past him as his own NOS kicks in. 

“Fuck!” Stiles yells, slamming his hands against his steering wheel. The bottom panel of his right hand seat immediately falls to the ground and sparks everywhere. Stiles tries to hold his hand up to block the damage, but he can tell his shirt is ruined and there is a good chance he’s leaving this with some serious burns. 

Derek’s well over a car length ahead when he crosses the finish line with Stiles coming in second. Stiles’ car rolls to a stop and he immediately hops out to get away from the damage. The engine is smoking and he winces. 

He watches as Derek rounds his car getting clapped on the shoulder by everyone as they celebrate his win. 

Stiles can’t help but smile when he realizes how he just nearly beat Derek Hale in a race. Derek Hale who until what Stiles thought was his retirement was undefeated and notoriously the fastest racer in all of California. 

“What are you smiling about?” Derek asks. “You owe me a car. And it’s probably not going to be that one.” He gestures to where Stiles’ car sits still smoking.

Stiles winces, but isn’t about to let anyone see him weak. “I almost had you,” he says with false bravado and a teasing smirk. 

After a moment, he adds, “And I can fix that.” 

Derek laughs, and the crowd laughs right along with him. This is a Derek that Stiles hasn’t seen before despite the many days spent eating at their place. 

This Derek is in command. He’s a presence that everyone respects and knows as the best. He’s running the show right now. 

“You never even had your car,” Derek says cockily as he walks closer to Stiles. “Pistol rings fried, lost a fucking floor board. Almost had doesn’t matter. Winning’s winning.” 

The crowd cheers heartily. 

“And losing’s losing,” Derek says as he gestures at Stiles. 

Somehow though, it almost seems like Derek’s impressed. Like he relishes the thought that someone’s even trying to give him a run for his money. 

“We’re going to rematch.” Stiles waves his arms around as he refuses to break eye contact with Derek. 

“What are you going to bet that time? Your servitude?” 

“If that’s what you’re into,” Stiles rebuts with a smirk that screams for a different location, one with a bed preferably. 

Derek starts to stalk even closer, moments from being less than an arm’s length from Stiles, but stops when a voice screams “cops” and everyone immediately makes a break for their cars. 

Stiles glances back at him, but he’s already in his car and peeling away. Stiles hops in his car and thanks every deity he can think of when it still runs. 

He turns several corners and hastily parks to avoid several passing cops when he sees Scott exiting a parking garage and walking down the street. The two cars that had just passed Stiles whip around and begin to track him as Scott takes off running. 

Stiles immediately cuts back around and loops around the block to sit at the end of the alley.

Scott pauses when he sees him, but Stiles kicks open the door and yells “get in!” Scott leaps into the car and the two go speeding off. Stiles turns several times until he’s sure they’ve actually lost the cops. He can’t risk running into the cops with Scott in his car and them accidentally blowing his cover. 

“Not going to lie, you were not even on my list of people I expected to help me out back there,” Scott says.

Stiles glances at Scott, but shrugs nonchalantly.

“No really, I appreciate it. You didn’t have to help me out and you stuck your neck out for me. That means something where I come from, especially when you already have priors.”

Stiles knows what Scott’s talking about, but only because he spent months putting together his cover story. There’s full internet support too. In this life, he went to juvie for lifting cars, but also has a history of stealing parts which he hopes will be a skill Scott will find useful. 

“Eh, they’d find a way to put you away for much worse than me.” 

Scott laughs and he rides along silently for a moment before he asks, “Lydia and I were wondering, how do you even pronounce your real first name-“

“Nope, not going to happen,” Stiles cuts him off. He used his middle name for his first name in this cover, but it’s equally as atrocious as his real first name. 

The first rule of going undercover is to give yourself enough similarities to your real life that you have save spaces to fall back on. An unpronounceable first name is one of Stiles’. 

“I thought I was going to be racing you tonight,” Stiles begins, keeping his eyes focused on the road to make it seem like it’s just a casual question.

Scott nods. “You were, but then Derek said he wanted to-“

Scott cuts himself off when he sees two men on motorcycles with automatics waving for them to follow. 

“What the fuck?” Stiles murmurs.

“Just do what they say,” Scott replies.

Stiles follows the motorcycles to a parking lot, and he and Scott exit the car. 

“Deucalion,” Scott says by way of greeting to the man whom the twins on the motorcycles move to stand behind. 

“Scott McCall, I thought you were smarter than this,” the man replies, “driving in my territory. You know our arrangement.”

“We were running from the cops who were sent to break up the race. You know how it goes.” Stiles can tell that Scott knows exactly how he’s playing the man, but it’s all factors that Stiles currently doesn’t understand. 

“I don’t think you’ve met Stiles yet; he’s new. Doesn’t quite have the territory lines down,” Scott continues. 

Deucalion stiffens, but then releases all his tension. 

“Don’t let it happen again, McCall. I’d hate for something to have to happen to your mother,” Deucalion replies.

For the first time since Stiles has met Scott, he seems well and truly angry, like someone worthy to be running one of the most fearsome racing gangs in LA. He knows the feeling though. He personally spends so much time constructing every undercover identity so that none of the criminals are ever able to tie anything back to his dad. 

Family is something you don’t fuck with. 

Deucalion and the twins drive away, but just as Scott and Stiles are about to reach the car, they return. 

Scott and Stiles back away as the car is shot with semi-automatics and then the twins quickly leave again without a backward glance. 

The car is riddled with bullet holes, but otherwise still standing. It takes Scott two beats, but then it hits him. 

“NOS!” he yells as he and Stiles dive away from the car as it explodes. 

Scott rolls over to look at Stiles and says, “You still owe Derek a ten-second car.”

Stiles catches Scott’s eye and they both laugh for a long moment as they let out all of their adrenaline. 

As his laughter dies down, Stiles leans his head back against the pavement and closes his eyes. He pretends he’s in agony over the potential cost and the entire situation, but really he’s just questioning whether or not he’s in over his head. He’s really worried that he might be. 

\--

The taxi drops Stiles and Scott outside Scott’s home where a party is clearly going on inside. 

“You want a beer?” Scott asks.

Stiles hesitates, not following Scott onto the porch.

“Come on, you’ve earned it.” Scott waves him on and leaves the door wide open for him to follow. 

Scott leads him through the house, and he can feel the wave of animosity that passes through everyone as they realize he’s there. Some of the crew seem ambivalent like Erica and Boyd, but others like Isaac seem truly angry. And of course, Stiles can see Derek out of the corner of his eye and can’t tell what he’s thinking at all. 

Scott walks over to the pack of beers in front of Isaac and grabs the last one and passes it to Stiles. 

“Hey- I was going to drink that,” Isaac protests. 

“You can have the last beer when you’re the one that just saved my ass from the cops,” Scott replies. 

The hush that falls over the crowd is palpable. 

“What?” Isaac asks quietly. Stiles can tell that it’s apparent that they all fucked up. The only one who doesn’t seem a little worried is Derek, but that may just be a mask.

“Stiles saved my ass which currently places him far above all of you in my book. Now, I’m exhausted, I’m going to bed. Don’t wake me up.” Scott heads up the stairs before he stops, remembering Deucalion’s threat. “Isaac, spend the night at my mom’s tonight.”

Isaac nods, no one questioning the watch order. It’s clear that they’ve dealt with these kinds of threats before. 

As Scott’s nearly at the top of the stairs, he calls out to Derek, “He’s going to have to get you a new ten-second too.”

Stiles ducks his head and hopes Derek isn’t too pissed, but when he looks up Derek is smirking at him. 

Stiles walks over to Derek and offers him the last beer. 

Derek shakes his head ‘no’. 

“Lost my car, but won favor with Scott,” Derek says, “you either really deserve the beer or really don’t.”

“I’ll get you a car,” Stiles replies as he swigs the beer and leans back against the counter.

“A ten-second car.”

“Don’t you want something that lasts a little longer than that?” Stiles teases. The stress of the day is breaking down his carefully constructed walls for undercover work. Letting himself tease Derek in order to relax is so far from his norm. This is by far the hardest job he’s ever worked for so many reasons. But actually liking the people he’s trying to infiltrate is a big one. 

“I doubt you could do much better than ten seconds,” Derek says as he gives Stiles a slow, thorough once-over. 

“I’m happy to show you,” Stiles counters with a smirk. 

Derek laughs and Stiles meets his gaze as he carefully considers him. 

“Not today.”

Derek gives Stiles one more parting glance as he leaves the kitchen. Stiles can hear him laughing with Erica from the other room, but he ignores it. 

Stiles slowly drinks his beer to numb him from feeling anything for these people, especially if they’re the ones killing people. He can’t be emotionally involved. 

\--

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

Stiles winces. It’s never good when his dad swears. He can see Kira trying to contain a laugh behind his dad. She gets way too much joy whenever Stiles manages to land himself in trouble. Which happens to be all the time.

“It wasn’t my fault. The Alphas shot it up and then it exploded because of all of the NOS and really it’s just amazing that no one got hurt-“

John cuts Stiles’ ramble off with a hand as he uses his other to rub at his forehead like Stiles’ antics give him a huge migraine. 

“I am glad you’re okay, but you need to be more careful.”

“I am being careful,” Stiles protests.

Jordan Parrish walks into the room and stands next to Stiles’ dad. “What he means Stiles, is that two nights ago there was another hijacking and another driver died. These people you’re infiltrating are killing left and right and I really doubt they’d hesitate to kill you.”

“Statistically, at their rate and history, they wouldn’t,” Danny pipes in without even looking up from his computer. 

Stiles glares at Danny for betraying him like that, but he knows Danny only speaks what the numbers and statistics prove true. He’s their tech guy, but he also is the best at looking at things as blatantly and logically as he can. 

“Honestly, I’m more convinced it’s the Alphas than anybody else at this point,” Stiles says.

This makes everyone else perk up instantly. A break in the case would be extremely welcome. 

“Do you have any proof?” Kira asks.

Stiles reluctantly shakes his head as he drums his fingers repeatedly against the desk. 

“No, but just trust me, the McCalls are rough around the edges sure, but they aren’t killers.” 

Stiles quickly realizes by his dad and Parrish’s face that they’re considering if he’s too involved so he quickly reneges. “I mean they could be, but you always say to trust your instincts, dad, and right now my instincts say the Alphas, but I need more time.”

“Stiles, the DA is getting on us about this case since the body count continues to rise, we need an answer.” 

Stiles nods and the group disperses. Stiles cringes, but knows he can’t wait any longer. 

“Uh- dad?” 

The Sheriff sighs deeply and turns back to Stiles.

“I do actually need another car.”

\--

Stiles hops out of the cab of the tow truck and strolls into the Hale garage. Nearly everyone is there working on something. He spots Scott in the back with Liam. Lydia and Boyd are up front tinkering with one of the engines. Erica and Derek are behind the counter. 

“I have your car,” Stiles calls out to Derek. 

Derek quirks an eyebrow disbelievingly at Stiles, but he and the rest of the crew follow him outside.

Once Erica sees the car, she bursts into laughter. Derek doesn’t even crack a smile, but from the teasing lit of his voice, Stiles can tell he finds it funny. 

“I said ten seconds not ten hours.” 

“It’s not that bad.” 

Derek scoffs at that. Lydia walks around the front of the hood and pops it open and lets out a low whistle.

“He’s not actually lying,” she says. 

Derek and Scott move to either of her sides and peer down at the workings of the car and now it’s Stiles’ turn to smirk. 

“See?” he can’t help but point out.

“You still have to do all the work and pay for all the materials,” Derek replies.

“Wouldn’t dream of anything else,” Stiles replies sarcastically.

“Until you prove it’s a ten-second car, you still owe me,” Derek answers. 

Stiles offers Derek a mocking thumbs up as Derek brushes past him. 

Scott walks over to him and lays a hand on his shoulder. “After the other night, you can have whatever help you need from the crew,” Scott glances at Derek, “well except for Derek.”

Scott shrugs and heads back inside. Stiles watches the pair who he rarely sees together. He can’t get a sense of their relationship. Everyone else defers to Scott, but not Derek. And Stiles knows that if he’s going to break the case, he has to figure out what’s going on. 

\--

Stiles rolls himself out from under the hood. 

“Anything?” he asks, but he’s rapidly losing hope.

“Nope,” Lydia pops from where she’s sitting watching the computer to see if all the tinkering Stiles is doing is actually helping increase speed. 

“Fuck,” Stiles curses and bangs his head against the bottom of the car as he tries to sit up. 

Liam walks into the garage and laughs at Stiles’ expense.

“Did you want to give it a shot?” Stiles retorts.

Liam quickly shakes his head.

“Didn’t think so,” Stiles mutters. He pulls himself up and leans next to Lydia to look at the computer she’s running the specs on. 

“You need to be able to hit at least 10 rps faster,” Liam says.

“Are you going to do anything helpful or are you just going to keep telling me things I already know?” Stiles asks Liam with a flourishing hand gesture toward the car. 

Liam glares at Stiles, but Lydia just waves at both of them to shut up. 

“I’ll work on it and see if I can think of anything else for you to try,” Lydia says.

“Thanks,” Stiles replies. He knows they don’t have to help him, and the fact that they are just means he’s integrating better than he expected to be. It also means he has a chance to gather more intel. 

“This fucking sucks,” Stiles says and leans his forward against the table, acting as casual as possible.

“Not as much as the fact that another trucker died,” Liam says off the cuff. Stiles immediately turns his head towards Liam and sees Lydia level a death glare at him. 

“It’s probably the Alphas,” Lydia replies, “It also doesn’t concern any of us so you shouldn’t worry about it.” 

Liam nods and looks appropriately cowed enough for Lydia to turn back to the computer. Stiles can’t tell what that interaction means. Are they the ones who are doing it? Or is Lydia just aware that if the wrong pair of ears heard them talking about it, they’d assume something wrong? 

Stiles is so distracted by his own thoughts that he doesn’t even notice when Liam asks him a question.

“Hm?” Stiles replies.

“Race wars? You going?” Liam repeats.

“His car- oh wait, my car- probably won’t even be ready by then.”

Stiles turns to find Derek weaving his way through the mess of the garage to where they stand. 

“You figure out the engine problem yet?” Derek asks Lydia as he immediately moves in between Stiles and Lydia to look at the screen. 

“No, and I desperately need a break from trying to help Stiles fail miserably.” Lydia stands up and pats Derek on the chest as she walks away with Liam quickly following. “Have fun.”

Derek scans the computer for a moment before he flops down and moves to scoot himself back under the car.

“I didn’t think you’d help me,” Stiles says to start a conversation. 

“You still assume I can only make sandwiches?” Derek shakes his head with faux disappointment. “Trust me, I like to get my hands dirty too.”

Derek smolders at Stiles for a moment before rolling under the car. 

“Just your hands?” Stiles teases as he watches Derek’s feet from where he lays under the car tinkering with something. 

Stiles can hear his chuckle from under the car. “You’ll just have to wait and see.”

Stiles opens his mouth to reply, but then he stops himself. None of this had any purpose for him with his job. He’s getting distracted. Derek is distracting him and that’s a distraction he can’t have. But on the other hand- Derek probably has information that would be useful for Stiles. However, he needs to keep his emotions out of it, and he’s no longer sure he can. 

Most of all he knows that his internal debate is not going to help him at all. He’s just going to have to go with whatever happens and work to solve the case as quickly as possible. 

He has to cut off his internal dialogue as Derek rolls back out to look at him. Derek stands up and leans next to Stiles to look at the computer again. He doesn’t leave any space between them and Stiles can feel the light sheen of sweat Derek worked up while working on the car. 

Stiles glances at him from the corner of his eye and has to resist the urge to lick his lips at Derek in his tank top now with a little sweat, a bunch of grease, and an overall shit-ton of sex appeal. 

Derek turns to look back and Stiles realizes that their faces are only inches apart. He and Derek stare at each other for a moment, but Stiles forces himself to break eye contact. 

“So what do you think?” Stiles says as he takes a step back to allow for his sweeping arm movement to gesture at the car. 

Derek shrugs, taking the space between them to stretch out his right leg. “It’s not as bad as it was.”

Stiles risks a glance towards Derek, and he’d say he almost looked a little disappointed. However, it’s impossible to know as Derek has even better masks than Stiles does, and Stiles’ are imperative to keep him alive so that’s really saying something. 

“That’s almost like a ringing endorsement from you,” Stiles jokes.

“Find me when you’ve got my car,” Derek says as he walks away from Stiles and back out of the garage. 

Stiles tries not to feel sad that he’s already leaving, but it seems that he’s lost all control over his emotions. As long as he doesn’t act on them, no one will get hurt. Or at least that what’s he’s telling himself to get through. 

\--

Stiles works on the car non-stop for the next several days. Nearly every member is back to help at some point, but he has yet to see either Scott or Derek again. He’s trying really hard not to take it personally. 

Lydia did solve the speed issue and he can’t help but be absolutely enthralled with her, but mostly because he’s always impressed with people who can keep up with him intelligence and sarcasm wise and she definitely can. He’s going to be sad when he solves the case and consequently, has to leave their newly budding friendship. 

Malia moderately terrifies him, but only because she’s unlike any girl he’s ever met before. Erica and Boyd are a brilliant team together, but neither has made any huge effort to help him. Liam’s still a little shitty, but he’s a hardworking little shit so Stiles has to give him that. Isaac only appeared once and was immediately removed by Boyd, but it seems like he still hates Stiles so he’ll have to deal with that eventually. 

He thinks the car is finally nearly ready for a test-run when he rolls out from under it to find Scott inspecting it. 

“Have you even slept?” Scott jokes.

“Not really,” Stiles replies.

“It’s looking good. But the real question is if it runs.”

Stiles stands up and uses a spare towel to wipe off some of the grease that’s made its way to his arms and shirt. 

“Just need to do a test run at this point,” Stiles says. 

Scott looks at him for a moment, considering, but then seems to make a decision and says, “You can show me how it works on the way to dinner at my mom’s.” 

Stiles nods and they both move to get all the extra tools out of the way. Even ignoring how seriously Scott took the threat on his mom, it’s easy to assume how much of a big deal this is. He wouldn’t let anyone he didn’t trust near his dad and he doesn’t even have to worry about any of the complications that Scott does. 

It’s clear he’s being fully accepted into the group. 

Stiles and Scott hop into the car and Stiles speeds away from the garage. Scott directs him as he goes, and Stiles moves as fast as he can without killing anyone. He swings along the last corner as Scott tells him to pull over.

Stiles gets out of the car and looks to Scott.

“Not bad.”

“Thanks,” Stiles replies. He can only hope not bad is good enough. 

“Race Wars is next week and before you hand the car over to Derek, you should race for us.”

Stiles nods. Scott walks around the car and pats his shoulder.

“But first, dinner,” Scott says.

“Thank goodness. I’m starving.”

Scott laughs and they both walk up the driveway to the area in front of the garage which has a giant table surrounded by chairs and covered in food. He can see nearly everyone as he walks up especially when they all fall quiet as they notice his and Scott’s approach. 

Isaac is the first to react. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Isaac-“ Scott warns as he steps towards him placating.

“You don’t even know him. I’m fucking out.” Isaac storms off before anyone can say another word. 

“I can go-“ Stiles starts.

“No, you should stay and eat. I’ll deal with Isaac later,” Scott says, “It’s not really about you. I promise.” 

Stiles nods. He thinks if Scott is on his side, he’ll be able to finally win Isaac over and get past this last hurdle to having their complete trust. 

“Mom!” Scott calls out. 

“Coming.”

Stiles watches as a gorgeous middle-aged woman comes out of the house carrying a plate of hot dogs with Derek following close behind with another plate. It’s immediately clear that this is Scott’s mom if by looks alone, but also by the easy, but commanding grace she carries herself with. 

She sets the plate down and immediately walks over to Stiles and pulls him into a hug. 

“Thank you,” she whispers before pulling back. 

“Of course,” Stiles replies. He can’t help but feel the sting of how much he has the potential to destroy this woman and her entire family. 

She laughs. “I just assumed you were Stiles.”

“I am, Mrs. McCall,” Stiles reassures. 

“Melissa, please. And help yourself to whatever you want.” She moves to hug Scott before sitting down. 

Stiles realizes that everyone has already found a seat and the last available chair is next to Derek at the end of the table. 

“Hey,” he says to Derek as he sits. 

Derek looks amused as he replies, “hey.”

Liam moves to grab a hot dog, but Malia slaps his hand. “We need to say grace.”

Melissa nods towards Malia. “Go ahead.”

Everyone links hands and Stiles can’t help but think that his and Derek’s fit together remarkably well. He’s thankful for the opportunity to close his eyes so he can gather himself. He hasn’t had feelings this strong for someone in a long while. Not to the point where things this simple seem to matter so much. 

It doesn’t matter. It can’t matter. 

Stiles repeats that mantra over and over to himself as Malia begins grace.

“Dear Lady Lord, thank you so much for the deliciousness that sits on the table in front of us thankfully from the goddess, Melissa.” 

The entire terrible tries to stifle the laughter, but not to much success.

“And thank you for inventing speed and cars and the ability to not give any fucks about the police or the dumb-ass patriarchal created rules in society.” 

Lydia gives her an “amen” for that. Stiles can feel Derek practically twitching with laughter next to him and he cracks his eyes open. Stiles meets Derek’s gaze and uses their joined hands to muffle his laughter.

“And thank you for this family,” Malia finishes. 

“To family,” Scott echoes. 

Everyone opens their eyes and cheers with their drinks. Derek squeezes Stiles’ hand before he lets go to grab his bottle of beer. 

“Dig in,” Melissa says. 

Stiles happily grabs food and makes small talk with Erica next to him. The conversation flows naturally around the table, and Stiles feels completely at home. He can’t imagine that these are the people who are killing all those truck drivers. But he also knows how much appearances aren’t true. He’s the prime case of it in this moment.

“Uh, sorry about earlier,” Isaac says to Scott as he walks back up to the group. 

Scott stands up and walks over to him and pulls him into a hug. “We’re just glad you’re back. Grab a seat. I’ll go find another chair.” Scott pushes him towards the chair Scott had just been sitting on and walks inside. 

Stiles glances up and sees Isaac glaring at him, but Isaac quickly looks away after a sharp word from Lydia. 

Stiles turns back to Derek and Erica and hopes that he can figure out a way to get Isaac to trust him and soon. 

\--

Stiles helps Melissa carry the last dirty dish into the kitchen. 

“Thanks again for dinner,” Stiles says.

“Of course, you’re always welcome here.”

Stiles knows that isn’t true.

Melissa moves over to the sink to start the dishes, but Stiles stops her.

“The cook shouldn’t have to clean the dishes too,” Stiles says. 

Melissa smiles fondly at him, but Stiles insists. 

“Can we keep you? Lydia and Malia are single. Or if you prefer men, it’s been awhile since Derek dated anyone,” Melissa jokes. 

Stiles blushes. “I’m just happy to help.” 

Stiles turns to the sink and starts to scrub the dishes. 

“I’m just teasing. At the rate you’re going, I’ll want to keep you around more than Scott. A son willing to do the dishes would be a welcome change.” She kisses him on the cheek and leaves. 

Stiles lets his brain wander as he scrubs the dishes. It’s things like this and working on cars that he’s always loved. He can keep his body busy, but his brain is free to bounce from place to place. Prime activity for a person with ADHD. 

However, it means he doesn’t notice when Derek walks into the kitchen and watches him.

“Melissa had you do the dishes?” Derek asks.

Stiles jolts up and splashes himself in the face. “I volunteered.” 

Stiles can feel soap running down his face, but he doesn’t have anything to wipe it with. Derek walks over to him and grabs a towel off the counter. He leans over and carefully wipes the soap. 

“Thanks,” Stiles murmurs because Derek is still close enough that he doesn’t need to speak any louder for him to hear. 

Derek gazes at him with what Stiles could only best describe as fond confusion, like Stiles is an enigma that Derek loves to try and solve. 

“I’ll dry,” Derek says finally. 

They work in silence for several minutes as they near the end of the dishes. It’s comfortable though, not awkward. 

Their bubble of domesticity is burst when Isaac walks in to grab another beer. Stiles instantly stiffens up, but Isaac doesn’t say anything. Not until he’s nearly out the door.

“Much more fitting work, I’d say. Cars didn’t really feel like your natural fit.”

Stiles tries incredibly hard to resist the temptation to turn around and beat Isaac’s face in because he knows if he did, he’d be pulled from the case and all his hard work would be lost. 

He doesn’t have to defend himself though because Derek beats him to it. “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

Isaac seems surprised when he realizes that Derek’s there too and that Derek’s sticking up for Stiles. 

Derek doesn’t let Isaac answer. “Are you saying that somehow when Melissa does the dishes, it’s lesser than working on a car?”

“No of course not,” Isaac hurriedly replies.

“Didn’t think so,” Derek says.

Stiles passes him the last dishes and dries his hands off. He smiles smugly at Isaac and relishes the moment when Isaac realizes he can’t do anything about it. 

Derek lets Isaac nearly get out the door before he calls out to him.

“Isaac?” 

“Yeah?” Isaac reluctantly turns around.

“What was that restaurant where you said was the best place for a first date? I think I have someone in mind that’d really like to go.”

“Really? Who? I haven’t been on a date in forever.” Isaac perks up as he talks; his tall frame finally looking closer to his height. “It was the Cuban restaurant over on 5th.”

“Yeah, that was it,” Derek replies and then turns to Stiles. “We should go there.”

Isaac quickly slumps in disappointment when he realizes that Derek had no intention to set him up. 

Stiles takes a deep breath and considers his options. He has to do this for the job or he’s going to arise suspicion. 

“It’s a date.” 

Derek smiles back at him, and both of them quickly forget that Isaac was even the start of all that drama. 

Stiles pretends that his happiness is all a façade, and definitely not because he’s thrilled to be going out with someone he genuinely likes. Just for the job. 

\--

Stiles leans back in his chair and scrubs his hands over his face. The room is dark to keep up the illusion that no one’s there, but Stiles doesn’t care. He’s just happy that for the first time in weeks, he’s not pretending to be something he’s not. 

He opens his eyes when Kira gently nudges his shoulder and passes him a mug of coffee. 

“Thanks,” Stiles says.

“You look like you need it,” Kira replies, “How are you holding up?”

“I swear they always have you as the liaison because you’re like a therapist for undercover cops.”

Kira smiles, but stares at him until he talks.

“I’m doing fine.”

“That was the least reassuring answer ever,” she responds. 

Stiles shrugs. “Have you been making sure my dad sticks to his diet? You know how he keeps a bag of candy in his bottom drawer under the files, you have to-“

“Yes, Stiles, I’ve kept an eye on him, but this is about making sure someone keeps an eye on you.” 

Stiles sighs and meets Kira’s gaze. He can feel himself crack. Kira’s a good friend and right now he needs to talk to someone to clear his own head.

“It’s hard,” Stiles starts, “but it always is. You’ve seen enough of us to know that.” 

Kira nods compassionately. 

Stiles struggles to find the words he wants to use to explain how he feels. He’s not even sure he should be trying to talk to Kira about it. 

“I’m dealing with it.”

“Are you?” 

Stiles laughs with what he hopes is only a hint of bitterness. “It’s hard to be emotionally invested with these people so they trust you and accept you and remain unattached.”

Kira pauses and then asks, “Do you need to be pulled out?” 

Stiles shakes his head with zero hesitation. “No, I’ll be fine. I know what to do if I realize I’m not.”

“Okay,” Kira says definitively. 

They’ve done this enough times that Stiles knows she trusts his judgment. Even if his judgment may not be right in this situation. Undercover cases are never supposed to involve romantic entanglements. 

She doesn’t need to know about his feelings that probably aren’t even real. 

“Do you have anything you want me to pass on to your dad and Deputy Parrish?” 

“Not yet, but I think I’m getting close. I just need some sort of lead, some twist I’m missing.”

Stiles stops picking at the hole in his jeans to look up at Kira. She’s doing her thing where she fiddles way more than normal and repeatedly tucks and untucks her hair. There’s something she knows.

“What is it?” Stiles asks. 

“I’m not supposed to tell you.”

“Kira!”

She snaps her head up to look at him. “It’s not my fault. Your dad knows you well enough to know you’d probably get yourself into trouble.”

“Probably’s not certainly. If it helps me solve the case then I need to know!”

Kira sighs, but caves. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

“Cross my heart.”

She smiles at him and crosses her heart too. They’ve developed way too many of these little things since being in the academy together years ago. 

“We received a tip that the Alphas have a bunch of tech that could be the stolen goods.”

“Are you serious? Why haven’t we moved on them?” Stiles asks. This is huge. This could be enough to prove Derek, Scott, and everyone else innocent. 

“Because it’s all just theory at this point. Nearly every crew is running specs similar. We need more proof before we can even get a warrant to search.”

Stiles understands. Protocol is one nasty bitch. That he thankfully doesn’t have to follow right now. 

Stiles stands up and heads for the door.

“Stiles?” Kira asks gently. 

“Yeah?” Stiles turns around to give her his full attention.

“Don’t do anything stupid. We all want you to come home alive, okay?” 

“I’ll try my best.”

He’s never been very good at sticking to the rules and they both know it. 

\--

Stiles parks his car down the block from where he knows the Alphas’ territory begins. He pulls his hood over his head and casually heads down the street. He makes sure to keep a constant surveillance on his environment while also sticking to the shadows, no matter how difficult that may be. 

He walks up to the warehouse and looks for a way in. Sadly this leaves his back completely unprotected. 

He hears the gravel crunch, but doesn’t even have time to turn his head before something cracks against the back of his skull and Stiles is out like a light. 

\--

Stiles slowly comes to and tries to make the faces staring down at him stay in focus, but they just keep spinning. His head is pounding and when he tries to stand up he feels like he’s going to throw up.

It doesn’t help that Isaac, who Stiles can finally recognize, puts a foot on his chest to keep him firmly on the ground as he towers over him. 

“I wouldn’t if I were you,” Isaac says and Stiles recognizes the sound of a safety being clicked off. 

“Isaac,” Scott warns. 

Stiles blinks three more times until his brain can finally focus enough to realize Scott and Derek are standing next to Isaac. 

“I told you he was a cop,” Isaac roars. 

Stiles pushes Isaac’s foot off his chest and leans over as he spits out some blood. “Fuck you. No, I’m not.” 

“Why else would you be here nosing around in other people’s shit? I knew I was right not to trust you.” 

Stiles tries to assess the situation as quickly as possibly because he knows time is of the upmost importance. If he says the wrong thing and they find out, he’s likely to die. If he says the right thing, he’s probably set forever. 

Derek is standing a couple feet back with his arms crossed menacingly over his chest. He seems to be completely emotionless. Scott is next to Isaac and looks simultaneously concerned and angry. Who those emotions are directed at specifically, Stiles can’t tell. 

“I’m not a cop,” Stiles repeats and slowly climbs to his feet while trying not to sway. He has to lean slightly against the wall to stay upright, but at least now he’s standing. 

Isaac keeps the gun trained on him as he scoffs in disbelief. 

“Like I believe that,” Isaac says as he moves to step closer, but Scott stops him.

“Why are you here?” Scott asks.

Stiles takes a deep breath. He knows how to lie. He’s been doing it for years to his dad and then for years as the force’s most frequent undercover cop. Use the truth and believe what you’re saying. 

“I wanted to find out what we are up against for race wars. When I was in the shop the other day to get parts for the car, I heard them talking and it sounds like they’ve got some hi-tech shit. I wanted to find out if we need to up our game.”

“You don’t believe this, right?” Isaac asks Scott and Derek. 

Scott looks uncertain and turns to see what Derek has to say.

“Only one way to find out,” Derek says, “we see if they really do have better specs.”

Derek walks over to the nearest open window and jumps up until he’s hanging from it. He proceeds to pull himself up and over and into the warehouse. Isaac immediately follows. Scott gives one glance to Stiles and offers him a hand.

“You’re never going to make it in on your own,” Scott says by way of explanation.

Stiles nods in agreement. He can barely walk right now let alone scale buildings. He thankfully thinks it’s only a mild concussion, but he can’t be sure. 

Stiles falls down into the warehouse and manages to land mostly on his feet. Scott follows and lands without a sound. 

The four of them maneuver their way to the cars on the other side of the building while trying to maintain as much stealth as possible. For Stiles, this means staying awake and upright. He can’t bother worrying about how much noise he’s making or anything like that, not when consciousness still seems to be a temporary thing. 

Derek pops the hood on the first car they see and lets out a low whistle. 

“He was right.”

Stiles gestures his hand to the cars and tries to manage a smug look, but he knows he probably fails. 

“Fuck,” Isaac curses in disappointment. “I still don’t think we can trust him.”

“Even after everything I just put myself through to make sure we don’t lose?” Stiles says.

“Especially then,” Isaac replies.

“Shut the fuck up,” Derek says suddenly. 

They all fall silent only for their ears to instantly be filled with the sound of approaching engines. 

“We need to hide,” Scott says, “now!” 

Scott, Derek and Isaac move deeper into the warehouse and are instantly lost to Stiles. Stiles is trying to figure out where he wants to hide, but his brain is moving so much slower than normal. It’s taking forever to process the fact that he is legitimately in a life or death situation at this moment and he can hear the garage doors beginning to open. 

Someone yanks him backwards and Stiles yelps. 

“Shut up,” Derek angrily whispers into Stiles’ ear as he claps a hand over Stiles’ mouth. He hastily pulls them behind several crates and keeps Stiles firmly pressed to his front so that both of them stay in the shadow. 

They watch as Deucalion, Kali, Ennis and the twins all enter the door. No one speaks for several moments, and Derek slowly lowers his hand from Stiles’ mouth, but doesn’t relax his hold on him at all. 

Kali paces around the room several times and comes within ten feet of where Derek and Stiles stand. 

Stiles thinks his brain is slowly but surely finally coming back online, but that could just be wishful thinking. 

She turns around angrily and asks, “What the fuck are we even waiting for?”

“Be patient,” Deucalion responds. 

“Patience is the most over-rated virtue,” a voice responds. 

The voice belongs to a tall leggy blonde with thigh-high black boots that she probably wouldn’t hesitate to kill you with. 

The second she comes into view, Stiles can feel Derek completely tense up behind him. He turns to mouth “what” at Derek, but Derek doesn’t let his gaze stray from the woman. Stiles gets the immediate sensation that he’s been missing huge pieces of vital information to solve the case and it definitely involves whoever’s walking through that door. 

She walks over to Deucalion and kisses him on both cheeks.

“Enough with the pleasantries, Kate,” Deucalion says. 

Kate Argent, Stiles realizes. The Argents are notoriously underground. He’s never even seen a photo of Kate before, and it took years to learn their hierarchy and member’s names. 

“Aw, Duke, you’ve got to romance a girl a little if you want to get anything.” She leans back against the nearest car, and Stiles swears he can see Ennis and Kali’s hackles rise. She is not a presence they appreciate. 

Neither does Derek, Stiles assumes. Considering Stiles isn’t sure he’s even breathed since she entered the room. 

Stiles has never seen him look so ill-at-ease either. 

“We got rid of your evidence, now you need to take care of ours,” Deucalion presses. 

Fuck they’re good, Stiles thinks. They know that nothing they’re saying is enough for a warrant, but it’s clear that they are far from legal. 

“Ah, yes, about that,” Kate begins.

Deucalion subtly waves his hand and Ennis begins to move towards Kate threateningly. He’s within range when she roundhouse kicks him across the neck and again on the chest so that he lands flat on his back. She has her stiletto pressing onto his throat within seconds. From how wet his cough sounds, Stiles is pretty sure he’s choking on blood and only has maybe a minute before he’s going to inhale too much of his own blood and die. 

Kali instantly moves towards Kate.

“Ah, ah,” She wiggles her finger at her, “take another step and it’s over for him. I promised you I’d help, and I will. But you need to remember your place.” She finally steps back off Ennis’s throat; Stiles winces as he can hear him gasping for air from their hiding spot. 

“But in order for that to happen, you need to trust me.”

Kate strides over to Deucalion and lowers her voice to the extent where Stiles can no longer hear what they’re saying and he internally curses her for it. 

Stiles can’t hear a thing. But he sees Deucalion’s reaction, and it isn’t good. He passes through anger, to fear, back to fury, before finally settling on resignation. 

“Let me know when it’s done,” Deucalion says.

Kate nods in agreement.

“Always a pleasure, Duke. We should catch up sometime. I’ve always thought you were such an impressive man.” She trails her fingers across his shoulders as he passes him. 

Stiles can feel Derek shudder once behind him. 

“Don’t bother, Kate. I know enough to not become like Hale.”

Kate shrugs like it’s his loss and struts out the room. They watch her leave, and Deucalion says, “Keep an eye on her.” 

The twins exit without another word as Deucalion and Kali help Ennis to his feet. 

“Does he need a hospital?” Deucalion asks.

Kali looks uncertain, but Ennis shakes his head. “Get him to Braeden, she can keep an eye on him,” Deucalion replies as he hops in his car and leaves. 

Derek and Stiles remain exactly as they are for at least five minutes until they’re sure no one is coming back. 

Stiles sees Scott moving towards them from the back, and he steps away from Derek. Isaac quickly reemerges and they all breathe a deep sigh of relief over how close to utterly terrible that could’ve been.

They start towards the exit, but Isaac stops and gestures towards Stiles. “What are you going to do about him?”

Scott considers Stiles for several long moments before turning back to Isaac. “I trust him and I don’t want to hear another word on it.”

Isaac nods reluctantly, but he and Stiles both know he no longer has a choice.

Stiles’ body nearly sags with relief. He’s a little worried that Derek will think he was overly worried, but Derek isn’t paying him any attention. He isn’t paying anything any attention, other than the effort it takes to get out of the building. 

Scott stops Stiles before they climb back out and says, “Don’t do anything like this on your own again.”

“Promise,” Stiles replies.

Scott nods like that’s plenty good for him, and Stiles wishes he could be friends with someone as straightforward as Scott in his regular life. His sincerity is utterly refreshing compared to Stiles’ normal peers. 

Scott glances at Derek who seems to be drifting and mindlessly watching the road, but he grabs Isaac and leaves before saying anything to him. 

Stiles clearly hasn’t lived through whatever gave Scott the logic to avoid poking at Derek when he’s like this because he stumbles over to him and makes sure he’s in Derek’s line of sight. 

“What was Deucalion talking about in there?” 

Derek turns towards Stiles like he’s finally realizing that someone is still around. 

“Nothing.”

“Are you kidding me? None of that was nothing,” Stiles protests. 

Derek stalks towards Stiles until he has him pressed against the side of the building. 

“First of all, keep your mouth fucking shut. You nearly got all of us killed with your idiocy, and I don’t want it to happen again. Second, it is nothing. And even if it wasn’t, why the hell would I talk to you about it? Third, try to pry into my life again and you won’t be happy with the results.” 

Derek backs away from Stiles and storms away. 

Stiles takes a deep breath and tries to get his head on straight. He should probably get it looked at. He has to get out of here first though. 

Derek, for all his posturing about it being nothing, just let Stiles know that it very much is something. Stiles tries to focus on the fact that this will help him solve the case and not on the fact that he may have just screwed things up with Derek. If he’s worried about that then it’s only because he now knows Derek may be crucial to solving things. Absolutely no other reason at all. 

\--

Stiles waits for the reactions as soon as he finishes his update. The room is so quiet you could hear a pin drop. His dad is the first one to break out of his stupor. 

“Did you get your head checked out?” He asks.

Stiles nods.

“Is it okay?”

Stiles nods again.

His dad walks over and thwaps him hard on the back of his head. 

“Ow! Fuck! It’s okay, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t still hurt like a bitch.”

“Good. It should. You nearly got yourself killed. It wasn’t your job to investigate that lead. The lead you shouldn’t have even known about it the first place.” The Sheriff shoots Kira a reprimanding look. 

Stiles watches Kira wince and back away. 

“We will be talking about this.”

“Yes, sir,” Kira replies. 

“Fuck, Stiles,” John says before pulling Stiles into a fierce hug. “Do you know how worried I was when you said you needed to come in and that you had also requested medical attention?”

“I’m sorry,” Stiles says into his dad’s shoulder, voice muffled by how tightly his dad is keeping him pressed. 

His dad pulls away and looks him over carefully. “We’re pulling you out.”

Stiles jumps up to stand. “No, you can’t!”

“You nearly died. Twice!”

“Isaac hit me, but now Scott trusts me implicitly. You’re not going to get another opportunity like this. You can’t pull me out, especially now that we know that Kate’s a factor.”

“We don’t know what she’s doing though,” Parrish interrupts, “What we do know is that Deucalion probably has the stolen goods and he asked her to destroy evidence. I say we move on him.”

“I don’t know, something just doesn’t feel right about that,” Stiles protests. 

“Logic says we take down Deucalion,” Danny points out. 

John says, “She’s up to something, but if we don’t close this case soon, the feds will be coming in. Deucalion is our best candidate right now. Stiles, do you think you can get more information about Kate? Safely that is.” 

Stiles shrinks back a little at his dad’s tone. He doesn’t like to do things that make his dad worry, but he’s not about to sacrifice a case to keep him worry free either. 

“I might be able to get Derek to tell me, but I’m not sure yet. He was really upset when I tried to bring it up…” Stiles trails off as he sees the way everyone is looking at him. “What?”

“I don’t know how to put this,” John begins.

“Just tell me.”

“He thinks you’ve been emotionally compromised by a pretty ass,” Danny says. “I mean, I would be too.”

“Fuck off,” Stiles spits, “Don’t talk about shit you don’t have any fucking clue about, Danny!” 

Parrish steps in between them and puts a hand on Stiles’ chest. “Calm down.”

Stiles turns away and sinks back into his chair. He glares at Danny for a moment before turning his gaze on his dad. “I’m completely focused. I can do this.”

Stiles can see his dad hesitating and he knows he needs to give his dad more reassurance before he’ll get the all-clear again. 

He’s not losing this case. 

“Dad, I promise I’ll tell you immediately if I get in too deep and then you can take me out. I just need a little more time to figure it out. We both know I can.” 

The Sheriff glances back at the open case file on the table and then back at Stiles before he nods. 

“The second you’re in too-“

“I swear, I’ll tell you,” Stiles assures. 

\--

Stiles may have promised his dad that he wasn’t emotionally involved, but as he walks up to Scott’s house he knows that’s no longer true. 

This home, these people, it all feels so much more important than just a job. So much more important to Stiles specifically. He feels connected to them in a way he hasn’t with anyone outside of work in a long, long time. 

“Beer?”

Stiles looks up and sees Scott sitting on the stairs up to the porch. He nods gratefully and grabs the beer and immediately downs a swig. 

“Thanks.”

“Seemed like you could use one,” Scott replies as he pats the space next to him. 

“Lost in my own thoughts I guess.”

Scott nods like he understands. Stiles feels like he does too. In fact, Stiles is beginning to trust him, which is practically rule number one of what not to do undercover. They sit in companionable silence for several minutes as they drink their beers. 

Stiles watches out of the corner of his eye as Scott opens and closes his mouth. Finally, Scott says, “I’m sorry about Isaac.”

Stiles shrugs and aims to seem noncommittal. 

“He just requires some time,” Scott continues, “He had some family problems before we found each other several years back and as a result, he has some serious trust issues. For fuck’s sake, he didn’t even trust me for the first four months I knew him.” 

Stiles chuckles politely at Scott’s attempt to keep things light, and Scott smiles appreciatively at him. 

“I think it irks him a little how easily you’ve fit in when it took him so long,” Scott resumes. 

Stiles feels like it was hell to get them to accept him, but when he thinks back on it, it has only been a couple months and he’s now a fully integrated member. 

“I don’t think he’s going to give you anymore trouble.”

“I get it,” Stiles replies, “We all have complicated pasts.” 

“On that note,” Scott begins. He seems even more awkward than when he started talking about Isaac if that’s even possible. “I want to talk about Derek.”

“Oh. I, uh- well,” Stiles stutters.

“That’s about how well he responded when I mentioned you,” Scott smiles awkwardly, “I don’t care at all or anything if that’s what you’re worried about, but I need to ask you to be careful. Not just for Derek, but also for yourself too. We want him to be happy; he’s been through enough. We all have.” 

Stiles nods and tries to convey that he’s going to do right by them even when he knows he won’t, he can’t. But, oh, does he want to. He’s starting to think he could spend forever with this found family and it’d be a well-lived life. 

“I’ll do the best I can,” Stiles finally replies.

“That’s all I ask,” Scott says. His phone buzzes with the name Allison. 

“A lady friend?” Stiles teases.

“Just a friend,” Scott replies, but his blush says otherwise. He stands and puts his hand on Stiles’ shoulder as he passes him to head into the house. “Derek’s in the garage just so you know.”

Stiles doesn’t really want to face Derek yet, not if he’s still mad at him, but he also doesn’t want to not see Derek. He’s missed his snark and it’s only been a few days. 

Stiles finds himself at the garage door without having really made the decision, but it’s too late to turn back now. 

He can hear Derek working from outside and there’s some sort of gentle jazz playing. Definitely not what Stiles was expecting, but almost unsurprising too. 

Stiles walks in, but doesn’t say anything as he sits himself down on a bench near where Derek is working. He knows Derek knows he’s there, but he’s going to let Derek decide when he wants to talk to him. 

After twenty minutes, Derek finally turns off the power saw and wipes off his hands before turning to look at Stiles. 

“Sorry about the other day. It wasn’t my place.”

“I overreacted.”

Stiles nods in agreement and Derek smirks back at him. 

“We good?” Stiles asks, “I really wanted to try that Cuban place, and I’d hate to have to take Isaac instead.”

Derek laughs. “We’re good.”

Stiles isn’t sure how he thought this would go, but it certainly wasn’t this. He figures if Derek doesn’t want to keep fighting then he’s definitely not going to stay with the argument. It’s like they can bicker non-stop, but any real fight and they both lose their will to keep fighting quickly. 

Stiles moves over to stand next to Derek and looks down at the car engine. 

“What’re you working on?” Stiles asks. 

Derek watches him carefully for a moment and Stiles stares right back; whatever Derek sees is enough for Stiles to earn this information at least. 

“It was my dad’s Camaro.”

Stiles moves to walk around the car, carefully running his hand along it. “It looks like you never drive it.”

“I don’t,” Derek replies, but he sees the question in Stiles’ eyes so he continues, “It’s all I have left of any of them. Scott, Melissa, everyone, they’re family, but they’re not-“

“Blood,” Stiles supplies.

Derek nods. He can tell Stiles understands, and Stiles does. Found families are just as strong of a bond, but there’s something different about your actual blood relatives. Stiles would do anything for his dad. 

Derek turns the saw back on and continues whatever he was working on. Stiles loops around the car one time to admire it before he sits back down to wait. 

Watching Derek work is a beautiful thing, but it’s also been well over half an hour that Stiles has been sitting there. He’s had plenty of time to catalogue Derek’s back, his shoulders, his delicious ass, and even every aspect of his legs. If he looks anymore, he’s pretty sure he’s going to jump Derek against his dad’s Camaro. 

Mercifully, Derek finally turns to him. “Let’s get food.”

“Thank fuck,” Stiles replies as he jumps out from his spot, “I didn’t know how much longer I was going to last.”

“I’d like to find out how long you can last, I’m sure I could speed things along.”

Stiles nudges his shoulder against Derek’s. “I’d like to see you try.”

“Oh, I will.”

Stiles shudders with the implication. 

He forces himself to ignore the warning bells going off in his head. The ones that tell him none of this has anything to do with the case anymore. The ones that say he definitely doesn’t need to sleep with Derek to get the information he wants. The ones that tell him he should leave and call his dad and tell him he’s in too deep.

But that’s the issue with being in too deep, you no longer want out. 

\--

Stiles groans around his taco, and he watches Derek’s eyes darken a hair. It’s not his fault the food is well deserving of pornographic moans. However, it is his fault that he likes to see how much he can rile Derek up. 

“Anyways,” Derek continues after he clears his throat, “Lydia had known Scott throughout high school. Erica and Boyd came as a pair. Scott ran into Isaac in the weirdest of circumstances and then kept seeking him out. Scott bailed Liam out of some trouble. And Malia, well, Malia sort of just showed up one day and said she was staying and no one had the balls to tell her no. Melissa thinks Scott has something about him that just needs to help people. It doesn’t hurt that everyone is drawn to him, and he’s drawn right back to them too.” 

“Well, Scott has appeal sure, but I was drawn to you,” Stiles grins sincerely. 

Derek’s lips quirk up in a tiny smile and nudges his foot against Stiles’ under the table. Stiles beams back at him. 

“That and the tuna sandwiches, of course. Possibly even better than this.”

“Bullshit,” Derek replies.

“Make me one and see.”

“I’ll only make you another sandwich if and when you finally get me my ten second car.” 

“That car’s done,” Stiles protests, “Scott told me to keep it until after Race Wars.” 

“Then you still owe me, don’t you?” Derek leans in and Stiles is unable to resist the pull to lean closer as well. “I’m sure you’ll think of something to do to repay all the time I’ve had to wait.” 

Stiles likes his lips slowly and tauntingly. 

“Before I give it to you, you’re going to have to race me again.”

“You want to lose that badly?” Derek teases. 

“The only reason you won’t race me is if you’re scared,” Stiles jokes. 

Derek’s voice loses some of its lightheartedness as he says, “I actually don’t race very much anymore. That was pretty much a one time deal.”

“Why?” Stiles asks. He stretches his hand across the table to rub the back of Derek’s soothingly. 

“My knee’s a piece of shit. I can’t have it bent like that for more than a couple minutes at a time which means races need to be short and contained.”

“What happened to it?”

“I was hit.”

“By a car?” 

Derek glares at him like that’s an incredibly stupid question. 

“No, by a spaceship. Yes, by a car, Stiles.”

Stiles rolls his eyes. 

Silence falls between them for a short moment. 

“I’m amazed you’re not wearing some geeky t-shirt,” Derek says as he gestures towards Stiles’ casual black shirt. 

Stiles quickly realizes that’s as much as he’s getting from Derek for now so he lets it go. It’s clear though that there’s more to it. 

“Your terrible style must be rubbing off on me,” Stiles teases back. He smiles in response to Derek’s laugh. 

He lets himself sink into the moment and enjoy what is shaping up to be the best date he’s ever been on. 

He can almost pretend that he’s just on a really great first date with a friend. He’s apparently gotten so good at lying now that he can even lie to himself. 

\--

Stiles grumbles at his phone as it rings noisily next to his bed. He unwraps Derek’s arm from around his waist so he can reach it. 

“Hullo?” He asks groggily. 

“Stiles, we’re moving on Deucalion. There was another murder tonight. Say ‘who is this’ if you have any new information that would change this plan. Say ‘wrong number’ if you agree,” Parrish says rapidly. 

“Wrong number,” Stiles replies and hangs up the phone. 

Derek rolls over and watches him as he scoots back onto the bed. 

“Who was it?” Derek asks as he runs his fingers through Stiles’ hair. He loops his arm back around Stiles’ waist to pull him closer. 

“Some telemarketer person, I think. Wasn’t really processing what they were saying at this current awakeness level.” 

“Hm,” Derek murmurs, “it’d be such a shame if you were really too asleep for- what is it- round four?” 

Derek pulls Stiles so he’s straddling Derek. Derek kisses his way down Stiles’ neck, stopping to gently suck and bite every now and again. 

“I think I’m waking up,” Stiles replies. 

“That’s good.”

Stiles groans as he feels Derek slide his finger into his still loosened hole. 

He can’t resist leaning down to kiss Derek, to relish in the press of their lips together. He forces himself to ignore that this is probably temporary. 

Right now, it’s about enjoying this moment. 

So he lets himself focus on the important things. 

Those things being Derek’s lips trailing down his neck. Derek sliding another finger into him. The drag of his cock against Derek’s abs. 

It’s just him and Derek. No outside world exists. 

He leans down to kiss Derek again, but quickly lets out a long groan as Derek adds another finger. 

“Derek, come on. I’m ready,” Stiles whines. 

“I thought you wanted to take longer than ten seconds.”

“I didn’t want to take ten years,” Stiles protests and tries to push back against Derek’s fingers to get him to move faster at least. 

Derek grabs Stiles’ hip with his other hand to stop his movements and slows his fingers down until they’re barely moving. 

“Fuck, you’re such an asshole,” Stiles pants. 

“Takes one to know one.”

Stiles knows he should find the humor truly appalling, but right now, it’s only making him want Derek more. 

“Derek,” Stiles pleads.

Stiles glares at Derek until Derek finally pulls out his fingers and rolls on a condom. 

Derek stares at Stiles patiently as he waits for him to do the work.

“Well?”

Stiles pushes Derek back and sinks down until Derek’s fully inside him.

“Dick,” Stiles grunts out. 

They both let out deep moans. 

“You certainly seem to like it at least.”

Stiles keeps his hands on Derek’s chest and rolls his eyes.

“Ass then,” Stiles sighs, “now shut up so I can ride you.”

He doesn’t wait for a response before he begins lifting himself until he’s practically completely off Derek before quickly sinking all the way back down. 

Derek grunts and Stiles pants as he slides up and down. 

“Derek. I need-“

“I know,” Derek says as he flips Stiles over and begins to thrust.

He keeps himself raised on one hand while he slides his other down to wrap around Stiles’ dick. 

If Stiles had any brain power that hadn’t already been directed to his cock, he’d be impressed by the fact that Derek can keep himself upright with just one arm. 

“C’mon, Stiles,” Derek moans, increasing the speed of his thrusts and his strokes on Stiles’ dick. 

“Derek!” Stiles moans as he comes. 

It takes only a couple more thrusts before Derek is quickly coming as well. 

Stiles embraces his post-orgasm high as he lays flopped out while Derek moves him into a dry spot and takes care of the condom. 

He drapes his body across Derek when he lays back down and feels Derek lope his arm around Stiles to bring him closer. 

Stiles knows he’s probably going to rot in hell for all this, but right now, all he can think about is Derek and how good being with him feels. 

\--

“Stiles,” Erica sing-songs, “Are you ready?” 

“Ready for what?” 

“Race Wars, of course. Aren’t you excited? I’m excited and I’ve been a billion times.”

Stiles shrugs. He is and he isn’t. Race Wars may very well be the last thing he ever does with all of them and he can’t help but wish he could spend his last days in the garage like he’s spent nearly every other day of the past couple months instead of in the desert at Race Wars. 

With Lydia teasing him, but also being an absolute genius. With Scott quickly becoming one of his closest friends because they just mesh. With Malia, who still terrifies him, but he’s come to recognize her strength and loyalty. With Liam, who annoys the shit out of him, but is also a kid Stiles can’t help but feel protective over now. With Erica being the Catwoman to his Batman. With Boyd, who he’s still trying to convince that they’re friends. With Derek. He can’t even think about Derek. 

Thinking about Derek means thinking about how Stiles has never felt this way about anyone before in his life. He thought he’d been in love with Heather, but, fuck, clearly he was wrong. 

He’s absolutely crazy about Derek. 

And there’s absolutely no way that it doesn’t end in heartbreak for both of them anymore. Stiles fucked up and he knows it. 

He brings himself out of his self-reflection before either of them can notice something’s wrong. 

“Do you think we’ve upgraded the cars enough?” Stiles asks Lydia. 

“We’ll have to wait and see won’t we?” she teases, “But we’ve done everything we can do from our end at least.”

“We’re the better racers for sure,” Erica tacks on. 

“So in the battle of the leaders who wins, Scott or Deucalion?” Stiles jokes. 

“I’m not sure,” Lydia replies. “I don’t think they’ve ever raced before.”

“Yeah, but Derek totally kicked his ass,” Erica grins like a mad woman. 

“Ouch, that must have been rough for Deucalion. Losing to a guy who’s not even the leader of the other gang.” 

Stiles continues to pack up their cars with everything they’ll need over the next several days.

“What are you talking about?” Lydia asks.

Stiles turns and sees them staring inquisitively at him. 

“Well, if Derek beat Deucalion and he’s not the leader of this here gang.” Stiles waves his arms about to emphasis everyone including the non-present parties. “Then Deucalion would be angrier, right?”

“Right,” Lydia says, trying to puzzle together what Stiles is getting at.

Erica immediately follows with a statement of her own. “Except for the fact that Scott wasn’t the leader when I got involved.”

Stiles freezes. “Seriously?” 

Lydia scoffs, “You didn’t pick up on that?”

“Derek? Not at all.”

Once again, Stiles’ entire focus for this case has had to be shifted as he learned something new. 

This changes things. Or maybe not, it may still just be Kate. But maybe it explains what the deal with Derek and Kate is. The real question is if Derek and Kate’s connection has anything to do with everything else. 

“Ever since the accident, Derek’s sort of taken a backseat,” Erica explains as she throws a couple more tools in her designer duffel.

“An advisory role, I’d say,” Lydia continues. 

“But he and Scott still make most decisions together.”

“Their teamwork thing works better in my opinion too,” Lydia says. 

Erica nods in agreement. 

Stiles tries to keep his internal freak-out completely invisible on the outside, but he knows he needs a cover fast so he can give himself time to process this. “Interesting. But I think the real question is who are your life-long rivals that need beating at Race Wars?” 

Erica immediately jumps in with an answer that Stiles pretends to listen to, nodding at all the right places. However, he pours all his mental energy into trying to see if this changes what he had thought about how the case was going to be solved. 

His real question is that if Derek and Scott are running things together, does that make them more likely to be running the hijackings? 

He thought he could rule them out because Scott seemed to be the guy who would never come up with something like that. He may go along with it and even be very okay with it, but it wouldn’t be his decision. Derek, however, if he had a strong enough reason, could be the one who would’ve made that decision. 

Stiles knows that so surely because it’s one of the things he and Stiles have in common. They’ll both do whatever it takes to survive and to protect the ones they love. If this was about surviving for Derek, then Stiles is seriously worried they may be the ones they’re looking for. 

\--

Stiles enters the precinct which is bustling with activity. He knows something must have happened if his dad actually told him to come in, but he was still incredibly careful about not being tracked. 

He hopes beyond hope though that this isn’t actually the end of his time undercover. 

He doesn’t know what he’ll do if it is.

Stiles scans the crowd for anyone who can explain to him what’s going and quickly heads over to Kira once he spots her. “What the hell happened?”

“Come on,” she says as she grabs his hand and drags him towards the interrogation rooms. “They found a ton of evidence to put Deucalion away for a long time, but none of it connects him to the murders or to the stolen tech.”

“Seriously?”

Kira nods and she points him to head into the listening room where his dad is already stationed watching Parrish talk to Deucalion. 

“What’d you get him on if not the murders?” Stiles asks his dad.

“Sex trafficking.”

“Really?”

The Sheriff lets out a long sigh. “All the evidence was right there for us when we raided his place. To the point where he’s either the worst criminal alive-“

“Or someone framed him.”

John nods. Stiles begins to ask his dad more, but they stop when Deucalion lashes out.

“I didn’t fucking do anything. And I certainly didn’t murder anyone,” he shakes his head like he’s disappointed in the cops for being so stupid. “You’re not getting another sentence out of me without my lawyer here.” 

Parrish nods and exits the room while Deucalion sits there smugly, but with a strong undercurrent of panic. 

“Do you believe him?” Stiles asks. 

“Deucalion has done a lot of a terrible things, and he’s going away for a long, long time, but this was too easy. Nor does it help us solve the hijackings.”

Stiles watches his dad slowly massage his neck as he tries to work the kinks out. He knows that means his dad’s been working too hard, but he also knows he isn’t going to stop until they solve this case. 

“I feel like I’m getting close to cracking it.”

“Did you find something out?” John asks. He looks hopeful, almost too hopeful. Stiles may have the technically harder job, but he’s beginning to realize what a toll this case has taken on everyone. 

He needs to solve this, now more than ever. 

Stiles shakes his head. “Not yet, but things seem to be falling into place.”

However hard this is on his dad, he can’t bring himself to tell him the thing about Derek and Scott yet. He can’t, not until he knows for sure. He’s not destroying that family until he’s one hundred percent sure that it’s the right thing to do. 

John seems reluctant to breach whatever he wants to say to Stiles, but he pushes through. “You know this means it’s most likely Scott and his people.”

“Or the Argents,” Stiles instantly returns with. “There’s something more going on, but I just need a little more time to figure out what it is.”

“I can only give you thirty-six hours before the feds are coming in and taking over the case. We either make an arrest or we’re pulling everyone out. That’s all I can do for you.”

“Okay,” Stiles replies and heads for the door.

“Son? You okay?”

Stiles nods. “There’s apparently no time to waste so I need to get going.” 

The Sheriff steps forwards and quickly hugs him. “Be careful.”

Stiles pulls away as soon as his father lets him and heads out the door. Now that he officially has a clock on his time left with everyone, he has no time to lose. He needs to solve this case and ASAP. 

\--

As Stiles pulls up to Scott’s, every car that he can see pulls away. He was told to meet here at this time so he tries not to be that concerned or offended. 

“Hello?” He calls out as he walks up to the house. 

“What, you thought everyone left you to find your way on your own?” Derek teases as he walks down from the garage. 

“For a moment,” Stiles replies as he walks up to Derek and quickly kisses him. 

“They got tired of waiting and since I’m riding with you-“

“You’re riding with me?”

“Rather you than listen to Scott’s terrible music selection for several hours. Boyd’s driving a car up for me to have there since my knee can’t handle the whole drive. You okay with that?”

“If I have to be,” Stiles jokes. 

Derek pushes him against the side of Stiles’ car and lines their bodies up so that there’s no space between them. He presses several kisses to Stiles’ throat. 

“How about now?” 

“A little more okay with it.”

Derek focuses on one spot, biting, licking, and sucking.

“And now?”

Stiles bites back a moan as he replies, “Mhm, yeah. I can be supportive of this.”

“Good, I’ll be picking the music then,” Derek says as he pulls completely away from Stiles. 

“Hey,” Stiles protests, trying to pull Derek back to him. 

Derek laughs as he opens the door of the car to climb in. Stiles doesn’t let him go until Derek gives in and lets Stiles properly kiss him. 

It takes another ten minutes before they’re both in the car. And another five after that before they leave. 

For all of them, Stiles had forgotten he was an undercover cop. 

\--

Despite Derek being in control of the radio, Stiles hasn’t minded a thing about this road trip. They’ve bantered at times and they’ve also just sat and watched the road pass in companionable silence. 

Stiles aches with how much he wants to keep it. 

Derek gestures to a trucker stop that’s coming up and tells him to pull over. They see Scott’s car as they head inside. 

Derek instantly spots him at a table near the back and they make their way through the make-shift restaurant to sit with him. 

“I was wondering when I would be seeing you two,” Scott says, “Got a little distracted?”

Stiles blushes while Derek shrugs and smirks proudly. 

They all order food and there’s a moment before conversation picks back up. Stiles rapidly decides that he needs to actively pursue solving the case no matter what. Even if it means putting an end to all of this. He’s a cop, and he’s going to do right by the law. If Derek and Scott are killing people then they need to be arrested. 

At least if he solves it, he may have some control over what happens next. If the feds come in, they’re going to take down absolutely everyone that they can. 

Stiles turns to Scott and clears his throat. “I want in.”

“In on what?” Scott asks. Derek eyes Stiles suspiciously from his place next to him. 

“On whatever you’re doing to earn all that extra cash.”

“We’re not doing anything.”

“Don’t treat me like I’m stupid.” Stiles keeps his voice firm. He’s not going to win this unless he acts as confidently as possible. 

Stiles watches them silently converse for a moment, and he’s once again amazed he didn’t realize they lead together until recently. It seems so fucking obvious now. 

“There’s no way you pay for everything that those cars are using with Derek’s sandwich money,” Stiles says. 

Derek cracks a smile at that and shrugs at Scott, letting him make the decision. 

“You certainly enjoyed them,” Derek replies. 

“That’s what you think.” 

Scott carefully watches Stiles, but Stiles knows the second Scott opens his mouth to speak that he’s won. He won their trust long ago and he hasn’t done anything to change that. Yet. 

“Do well at Race Wars and then we’ll talk.”

\--

Stiles and Derek pull up to the entrance to Race Wars, and Stiles lets out a low whistle. It’s unlike anything he’s ever seen before. The desert is covered with hundreds of cars and he can see where a race is finishing off to the side. 

Derek directs him until they pass the entire line-up of cars.

“Are you ready?” Derek asks. 

“Ready for what?” Stiles replies. 

Stiles rolls forward and realizes that he’s lined up against another car to race. Stiles looks at Derek questioningly. 

“This is how you get in to Race Wars,” Derek explains, a teasing lit to his voice as Stiles glares at him for not sharing this piece of information sooner. 

The starter explains the rules to both cars and then moves into position. Stiles glances over at Jackson who smirks smugly in return. 

“You ready to lose, loser?” 

Stiles rolls his eyes. “If you’re so confident let’s make this a little more interesting,” Stiles replies. “3 g’s.”

Jackson cackles. “I’m glad to take your money.”

“So it’s a deal?”

“Sure,” Jackson replies. 

Stiles glances at Derek, but Derek doesn’t say a word, clearly wanting to see if Stiles can in fact put his skills where he just put his money. 

Stiles pours all his focus on the flagger’s face, and slams on the gas when they get the signal to begin. He can see Jackson out of the corner of his eye. He has a half car length lead, but Jackson steadily begins to regain that until he has several feet of lead on Stiles. 

Stiles has a white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel. 

He nearly jumps out of his skin when Derek leans over to whisper in his ear, “If you do well, you’ll be rewarded.”

Stiles waits until Jackson has nearly a car’s length ahead and presses for his NOS. He passes Jackson inches before the finish line. They can hear Jackson cursing from his car.

Stiles grins at Derek. “You’re going to give me a complex.”

“I wasn’t sure you were going to win,” Derek replies. 

“Nah, I can tell you had complete confidence in me.”

They pull off to the side while they wait for Jackson to come back. Stiles leans back against the car and pulls Derek in between his legs so he can kiss him. 

He has no idea how long he’s been lost in the feeling of Derek’s mouth against his and his ass in his hands when a wad of cash hits the side of his head. 

“Hey,” Stiles yells at Jackson’s rapidly retreating back. “Fucker.”

Derek tugs on his hand to keep him from following Jackson and says, “Let’s go find everyone.” 

He laces their hands together as they walk through the crowds, anchoring Stiles through all the action and distractions. 

\--

Derek leads Stiles through the tents and trailers until they come upon the rest of their crew. Derek heads to find them some beers and Stiles sits down in the circle of chairs. Everyone is relaxing, laughing, and drinking beer. 

“I heard you beat Jackson,” Lydia says, “congrats.”

Stiles nods his thanks. He leans back and just soaks in the moment, which he knows is once in a lifetime. 

Erica walks over and leans down to whisper in his ear. “Impressive right?”

“Completely,” Stiles agrees without a hint of sarcasm. This may be the coolest thing he’s ever seen. 

Derek hands Stiles a beer, and Stiles smiles back gratefully. 

“Don’t get too comfortable,” Boyd says. 

“Why?” Stiles tenses up. He can’t tell what Boyd might mean by that from his tone. 

Derek looks at him curiously like he’s a puzzle that Derek can’t figure out, mostly because he keeps reacting in ways that don’t quite make sense. 

“We’re all about to go watch Scott race,” Erica supplies. 

The group slowly wanders back to the racing area. Somehow Stiles is roped into giving Malia a piggyback ride there, but he doesn’t mind. 

It feels like acceptance. 

“Scott’s up,” Derek says as he taps him on the shoulder to look in the direction of the starting line.

Stiles watches as Scott stands outside of his car talking to a pretty, tall brunette girl.

“Who’s that?” 

“Allison Argent.”

Stiles looks up sharply at that. 

“I didn’t realize the girl Scott was crushing on was an Argent.”

“Yeah,” Derek replies. He doesn’t seem too happy about it. 

“She seems nice.”

Derek shrugs.

“Scott certainly seems to like her.”

“Maybe.”

Stiles lets it drop. It’s clearly not a topic he’s going to get a lot of detail on from Derek. 

Within the blink of an eye, Scott and Allison are off from the starting line and racing each other down the stretch. Stiles stands on his tiptoes to try and watch the finish line, but they’re so close they can’t tell who won.

“Did anyone see who won that?” Isaac asks. 

They all shake their heads. 

Scott pulls up in front of them and jumps out. 

“Who won?” Lydia moves closer to Scott in anticipation of an answer.

“I don’t know,” Scott replies. “It was really close.”

“Too close actually,” Allison says as she walks over. “They can’t decide a winner. I guess we’ll just have to have a rematch sometime.”

“I’d like that,” Scott grins. “Anytime you want, I’m there.”

Allison smiles shyly and leaves. Stiles walks over to nudge Scott. 

“It’s like watching two middle schoolers flirt,” Stiles teases.

“Shut up.” Scott shoves Stiles away from him while stealing glances at Allison’s departing form. “It’s not like that.”

“Puh-lease. I saw you two. I mean she’s clearly into you too.”

“Really?” Scott asks hopefully, but then visibly droops. “It doesn’t matter. It’d be too complicated.”

“Fuck complicated.”

Scott stares at him.

“No, seriously,” Stiles continues, “If you like her and she likes you then shouldn’t you at least try to work past all that other shit? I mean it’s not like this is a new thing for you, right?”

“No, I’ve been impressed with her since the moment I met her. She’s just really awesome. And fun. And pretty.”

Stiles looks at him like what else could even matter. 

Scott considers it for a moment, but then seems to shrug it all of. “For now, I need to go check on things.”

“Sure,” Stiles replies. 

He looks around and realizes most of the group has departed to different places. With only Isaac still in sight range. 

Something bumps into Stiles and nearly throws him to the ground. 

“Hey!” 

The kid turns around and Stiles realizes it’s Liam.

“Sorry, Stiles,” he says as he continues walking backwards, “I gotta go. I’m racing for slips.” He waves his pink slip in the air. 

Stiles shrugs him off. He probably knows what he’s doing, and it’s not Stiles’ place if he doesn’t. 

Stiles attempts to make his way back through the crowds, but takes his time, enjoying the atmosphere. The music, the dancing, the drugs, it’s all in a world of its own. 

Eventually he spots Derek and walks over and loops his arms around his waist. 

“Hey,” Derek says as he turns around.

“Hey,” Stiles repeats and smiles back. He realizes they’re the super obnoxious overly happy couple right now, but, fuck it, he doesn’t care. 

“What do you want to do?” Derek asks.

Stiles thinks about it. “Well, we can either be good friends and go watch Liam race or-“ Stiles presses his body tight against Derek’s. “We could go find some place a little more private.”

“Liam’s racing?”

“Yeah, for slips.”

“Fuck,” Derek replies as he pulls away. “We need to find him.”

\--

Stiles has to run to keep up with Derek as he weaves through the crowd to try and catch Liam. Derek had quickly explained that he doesn’t know what Liam’ll do if he loses since it’s his mom’s car and as much as Liam’s good, he’s not better than a lot of people here. 

They make it right as Liam is pulling up to the starting line- too late to stop him.

“Fuck!” Derek pulls at his hair. 

They watch as the other driver walks through the crowd and to her car. 

“Isn’t that-“

“Kate,” Derek says harshly. 

Stiles can feel Derek’s body thrumming with anger and fear. There’s not a chance in the world that this is going to turn out okay. 

It’s over before it’s really begun, and Kate beats Liam by several car lengths. Instead of turning around and coming back, Stiles watches in horror as Liam just continues driving away. 

“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” Derek looks ready to absolutely wreck something. “You should’ve stopped him.”

“How the fuck was I supposed to know that he shouldn’t race?” Stiles rebuts. 

“No, clearly, he shouldn’t have.” A chill runs down Stiles’ spine at the voice. They both whip around to look at Kate. “And now he just drove off in my car.”

“I’m sure he’s just going to gas it up,” Derek says, voice oozing with fake pleasantness. 

He’s trying to act like Kate has nothing to worry about so they have enough time to find Liam and deal with this before Kate decides she needs to go looking for him. 

“Derek, sweetie,” Kate begins as she stalks over to him. She runs her finger along his shoulders and chest as she circles. “We both know I wasn’t the fool in this relationship. Now, I want my fucking car.”

“You’ll get it.”

“I better.” She stops in front of him and pushes herself against him. She taps her finger against his lips. “You know I always get what I want.”

She spins away from him. “It’s only a matter of time for him… and you.” 

“Rot in hell, Kate,” Derek sneers.

“Only if you’re there with me,” she winks and begins to walk away, but stops in front of Stiles. 

Stiles tries to stare confidently at her, but knows he’s not succeeding. 

“I never really pegged you as the kind of guy to go for a twink, Der, but I guess I can see it.” She turns back to Stiles. “He seems like the kind of worthless trash that’s just your type.”

In an instant, Derek pulls Kate away from Stiles and throws her against a nearby car. He’s holding her by the front of her shirt, and his right-hand is already balled into a fist. Stiles rushes over and pulls him back, putting all of his force into it. 

“Derek, don’t! She’s not worth it,” Stiles pleads.

“Yes, Derek, don’t,” Kate taunts. “How’s that knee of yours treating you?”

Stiles yanks even harder and he and Derek go flying back onto the ground. Derek stands up and walks away without another word. 

Stiles tries to follow him to get him to calm down, but Derek keeps brushing him off.

“For fuck’s sake, Derek, what was that?”

Derek spins around on Stiles and gets in his face. “None of your fucking business. None of it’s any of your fucking business,” Derek yells. 

Stiles keeps a straight, unemotional face at all costs. Derek stares at him, but quickly deflates as if Stiles popped his balloon and all of the aggression has been released. 

“I just need some time, okay?” Derek asks, but he doesn’t wait for an answer. He quickly kisses Stiles and leaves. This time Stiles doesn’t follow. 

\--

Stiles spends the rest of the day killing time, hanging out with other people, but never everyone at once as they all come and go throughout the day. 

As most everyone is gone at the moment, he quickly realizes this is his opportunity to do a little digging and heads for the trailers to snoop under the cover of the night. No one pays any attention to his departure. 

He makes his way through the party that is raging on all around him until he sneaks through the door to Scott’s trailer. 

He digs through some papers on the desk, but he sees nothing out of the ordinary. Luckily, all of the windows are open and he can hear Scott and Derek talking. He can’t pick out any specific words, but the conversation doesn’t sound happy. 

They must agree to let whatever’s wrong be because they clasp hands and pat each other on the back in a quick hug and Scott jumps into a car with Lydia and leaves. Two other cars that Stiles thinks contain Erica, Boyd, Isaac, and Malia quickly follow. 

Derek immediately turns away and begins charging through the crowd. 

Stiles runs outside to catch up to Derek. “Hey, what was that?”

“Nothing,” Derek replies without glancing at Stiles.

“Seriously? That’s what you’re going with?” 

Derek spins around and faces Stiles. “Stay out of it.” 

“Where could they all possibly be going at this time? It’s the middle of the fucking night,” Stiles takes a deep breath, but he knows he has to go there. “Is this about the hijackings?”

Derek turns around and keeps walking. “What are you even talking about?”

“I can’t believe you guys are the ones fucking killing people.” Stiles rakes his hands through his hair. 

Derek pauses and Stiles thinks he can see him hesitate. Whether that’s an admission of guilt or not he can’t tell. 

“Stiles, stay out of this,” Derek pleads. “You don’t know what you’re getting into. We’re not-“ He doesn’t seem to know how to finish his sentence. 

Stiles has this feeling in his gut. Something that hasn’t gone away since Liam lost his race. If he doesn’t do something, he knows something bad is going to happen. And he can’t get anywhere if Derek won’t admit anything to him. 

“Derek, I know exactly what I’m getting into. Are you the ones killing people?” 

“Of course not. I don’t see why it makes a fucking difference to you.”

Stiles grabs Derek’s arm before he can turn away. 

“Derek, I’m a cop. I’ve been since the moment I met you,” Stiles admits. 

He watches the realization pour over Derek until he’s clearly warring between beating Stiles to death and the clear heartbreak on his face. 

“What-“ Derek doesn’t even try to formulate a proper sentence.

“I was sent undercover to investigate the murders. I’m a cop. “

Derek raises his hand, but then lowers it again. He turns and walks away without another word. 

“Derek! Derek, stop!” Stiles tries to grab his arm. 

“Don’t fucking touch me, I can’t promise what I’ll do to you.”

Stiles tries to get Derek to look at him, but regrets it the moment he does. He’s never seen so much unbridled hate matched with complete pain. Derek’s clearly trying to mask it, but he’s failing spectacularly. 

“Derek,” Stiles’ voice cracks. “I wasn’t lying about wanting to be with you or what I felt. Not for one moment. But this isn’t about you and me.”

Derek scoffs. 

“If you aren’t killing people, but you are doing the hijackings-“ It’s not a question, but Stiles phrases it as one enough that Derek nods. “Then we both know that there is one person who could be doing the killing. Derek, the way she was threatening you today, she’s up to something. Do you really want to risk everyone? Scott? Lydia? Erica? Boyd? Malia? Isaac?” 

Derek doesn’t say anything, but he seems torn.

“Derek, I can help you, if we can show that the murders were her. No one-“

“You’re really going to try to convince me none of us are going to jail.”

“I can try!” Stiles yells back. 

Derek doesn’t respond, but neither does Stiles because it just became unavoidably clear how deep Stiles got. He should’ve arrested Derek the moment he realized what was going on, but now he’s standing here promising to take down Kate if it means getting the rest of them off. 

“I don’t mean to butt in-“

Derek and Stiles whip their heads to look at Allison Argent who clearly heard a lot of that fight. 

“What?” Derek growls. 

“I don’t agree with how my aunt has been running things, and I don’t want her to hurt Scott.” 

Stiles takes half a second to celebrate for Scott before he realizes that Allison would only be talking to them if Kate was going to take some very drastic steps. 

Derek’s already processed that and is moving threateningly towards Allison. “What is she planning?” 

“She wants to take everyone out. Originally she wanted to frame you for the murders, but now that’s she’s managed to take out Deucalion, she thinks it would be easier just to kill everyone.”

“Fuck,” Derek yells. The few people casually watching their argument quickly look away. 

“Tonight’s job is a set-up,” Allison concludes. 

Derek strides towards Allison and grabs her by the throat. “And you didn’t think to mention it till now.”

Allison coughs around the pressure and can’t answer. 

“Derek! Fuck, Derek, stop!” Stiles pulls urgently at Derek’s arm.

Derek instantly lets go, but turns to Stiles and snaps, “I don’t want to hear any fucking thing from you.”

“I didn’t know until I just overheard her. If I had, I would’ve warned you sooner,” Allison wheezes. 

“Sorry,” Derek mutters gesturing towards Allison. She shrugs it off. 

“I’ve had worse,” she replies.

Derek offers her a short nod which Allison returns. An accepted truce for the moment. 

“Can’t we just call them?” Stiles asks. 

“They leave their phones to avoid tracking,” Derek says. He’s becoming more and more visibly frustrated as the minutes tick by. 

“Derek,” Stiles starts and waits for Derek to turn and look at him. “I’m a cop, if I know their general whereabouts and what they’re driving, I can have people search for them on satellite, but I need your help.”

Derek’s indecision could not be clearer. 

“Derek, please help me.” Stiles steps closer to Derek and puts his hand on Derek’s arm. “We save your family and then we stop Kate, okay? But we have to work together.”

“Fine,” Derek yanks his arm away and finally says, “let’s go.” 

\--

Stiles speeds down the road and watches from the corner of his eye as Derek rubs his knee and tries to stretch it out. They’ve already been driving for awhile. 

“You okay?” Stiles asks.

“Fine,” Derek mutters. 

“Derek-“

“Don’t talk.”

Stiles sighs. This is going incredibly well. “I won’t say anything after this, but we passed where they store the cars. We’re not going to magically find them.”

“What are you suggesting?”

Stiles pulls out his phone and dials Danny. “This is Officer Stilinski, serial number 34762, I need a satellite trace for four cars. Derek, what’s the description?” 

Danny sucks in a breath harshly when he realizes what’s going on, but doesn’t say anything. 

“Derek-“ Stiles beseeches.

Derek grabs the phone from his hand and describes the cars with license plate information. He looks like he wants to kill Stiles and would enjoy it. 

Stiles takes the phone back. “You all set?” 

“I’ll call you back when I have something,” Danny says, “and Stiles?”

“Yeah?”

“Be careful.”

They both know it’s far past that point. Stiles is so far from protocol right now it isn’t even funny. 

Stiles lasts about ten minutes without saying another word, but he has to break the tension that permeates the car, it’s just who he is. 

“I didn’t mean for it to happen like this.”

“How the fuck did you mean for it to happen then? You’re a fucking cop!” Derek spits, glancing at Stiles before quickly turning away again. 

“If I had been smart about this, I would’ve had them pull me out months ago. That’s what you’re supposed to do when you feel yourself getting too attached, too deep, but I think I was too deep the moment I stepped into your garage.”

“I don’t care.”

“Okay,” Stiles breathes out. 

Derek barely lasts thirty seconds before he can’t contain his frustration in the silence. “Stiles, you’ve been fucking lying to my face for months. I can’t trust anything you say to me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“What does sorry do?”

“I don’t know.”

Stiles takes several deep breaths and focuses on keeping himself together. He’ll have time later to deal with everything, lots of time probably because he’s not seeing a way he leaves this without at least a suspension. Right now, he needs to save his friends, not that they’ll consider him as one when everything is done. 

Derek laughs bitterly, “Isaac was right. Knew you were a cop. Tried to tell me that you were just like Kate too.“

“Don’t kill me for asking,” Stiles says, “but what am I missing about Kate?”

“Does it matter anymore?” Derek sags dejectedly. 

“Because if she’s acting out of vengeance or greed or heartbreak then it changes what she’ll do.”

“You think I broke her heart?”

“I think you haven’t told me anything. I lied to you, but it’s not like you were a shining beacon of truth either.” Let the record show that Stiles absolutely never knows when to shut his mouth. 

“Rich, Stiles, real rich. I was trying to protect you whereas you were trying to destroy everyone I care about.”

“I was trying to prove you innocent!” Stiles risks a glance at Derek. 

“We were together for two years. She’s the one who hit me. I’m sure she was trying to kill me, but having ruined my ability to race must have worked just as well for her. She tried to cause problems between Scott and I so she could destroy us. This was probably her way to get the Alphas and us out of the picture as well as finally taking everything from me.”

“Why would she-“

“Because she’s fucking crazy. And a hate-filled person.”

Stiles meets Derek’s gaze. “We’ll get her. I’m not going to let anything happen to any of you.”

Stiles’ phone rings shrilly. He listens to Danny give him their location and takes the next exit to course-correct. 

“How does this normally work? I need to know what we’re heading into.”

Stiles listens carefully as Derek describes how the crew takes out the trucks trying to guess how he thinks Kate has rigged things. 

He hopes they’re not too late. 

\--

The night has already faded into day when they catch up to everyone. They can see the truck in the distance, but it’s impossible to tell the situation from how far back they are.

“Is that-“

“Should be,” Derek replies.

Stiles can tell they’re both thrumming with the tension of ‘what if.’ What if they’re too late? What if they can’t save them? What if, what if, what if. 

Stiles swears under his breath as they hurtle past several flipped cars and one that’s engulfed in flames. Boyd’s helping Malia climb out of her car. Lydia’s tying something around Erica’s arm like a tourniquet. 

“They look…” Stiles searches for the right word, “alive.”

“Scott and Isaac have to be ahead. Keeping going,” Derek grits out. 

As they approach the truck, they can finally see that there are three armed men, one standing in the back which is empty, one in the front with the driver, and one standing over Isaac who’s also in the back. The sides of the truck must have been cloth because they’re no longer there. 

Stiles quickly puts together how they were ambushed and he realizes they don’t have much time before they’re shot themselves. 

Scott’s still driving and weaving to avoid the gunfire, but he has no way to rescue Isaac and escape. 

Stiles pushes at the roof of the car until it comes flying off.

“What are you doing?” Derek asks.

“Take the wheel, put your foot on the gas,” Stiles says, “now!”

Derek slides until he’s practically under Stiles. 

“We’ve got maybe ten seconds from the time I stand up to get me on the truck before they take us out, get me within seven feet in those ten seconds, okay?”

Derek nods. His focus and drive is unquestionable; Stiles trusts him. 

“Ready?” Stiles pulls himself to a crouch. “Go!”

Derek accelerates, but the gunman on Isaac quickly realizes something is wrong. Stiles watches the gap close, but knows he has to go for it or get shot at which point Isaac will die, and Scott and Derek probably will as well. Stiles steps on the windshield, and takes an extra step on the front of the car to propel himself onto the truck. 

He lands in a roll and immediately pops up and punches the gunman. Stiles fights with him for hold of the gun and the automatic ends up going off. It cuts a line across the windshield of Stiles’ car, but misses Derek. 

The other gunman finally connects with Scott’s tires and Scott goes spinning off the side of the road, but his car remains upright. 

Stiles stomps on the man’s foot enough times to control the gun enough to aim it at the other guy as he turns around. He’s dead before he hits the ground. 

Stiles yanks the gun and swings it back to bash it in the gunman’s head. He flops to the ground next to Isaac who’s unconscious. 

He immediately kneels beside Isaac to try to do damage control. He has at least three gunshot wounds and has already lost a lot of blood. 

Stiles starts to stand up to try to find something to staunch the bleeding or a way to get Isaac off the truck when Derek yells, “Stiles, get down!” 

Stiles drops to the ground without any hesitation as the gunman in the front shoots out the back directly where Stiles’ head was. 

“Fuck,” Stiles says. He knows he can’t jump with Isaac’s weight and get him to safety. “Don’t kill me.”

He slaps Isaac to get him to regain consciousness. It takes several hits, but Isaac’s eyes open. They slowly focus on Stiles. “What?” Isaac chokes out. 

“I’m going to get you off of here, but I need your help.” Stiles drags Isaac so that they’re near the back of the truck. 

“Derek!” Stiles yells. Derek avoids several more shots before he’s able to get in range of Stiles. “We’re going to have to jump.”

“How are you-“

“Leave that to me, just get fucking closer!” Stiles turns to Isaac. “Isaac!”

Isaac groggily opens his eyes again. 

“I’m going to pull you up, I need you to lean against the wall and then wrap your arms around me. Okay?”

He’s not sure Isaac’s even aware who he is, but this is his only chance. He ducks as the shot gun is fired again, but then he hears the sound of the gun being loaded so he knows this is the moment. 

He hauls Isaac up and Isaac manages to hold on to him. The driver starts zigzagging across the road so Derek can’t maintain a steady spot. 

“Derek!”

“I’m trying,” Derek grits out. 

Derek anticipates the driver’s next cut back and is in place long enough for Stiles to grab Isaac and jump onto the hood of the car. They land roughly, but they’re at least off the truck. 

Stiles keeps one hand tightly gripped on Isaac while he grabs the broken glass of the windshield to anchor them on the car. He can feel the glass sinking into his hand. 

As soon as they land on the car, Derek takes his foot off the gas and steers them off the road as the truck continues down the highway. Derek pulls to a stop and Stiles lets go of the glass, wincing as it rips out of his hand. He and Isaac slide off the car by pure velocity. 

Stiles immediately turns to Isaac who’s no longer conscious. He feels for a pulse, but can’t find one. 

“Damn it,” Stiles swears as he starts compressions. 

Derek climbs out of the car as Scott runs over. 

“Derek, I need you to take over,” Stiles grunts out. He can feel his blood mixing with Isaac’s. “If we don’t get him to a doctor in the next five minutes, he’s dead.”

Scott looks at him in horror as Derek starts compressions. Stiles pulls out his phone and dials, “This is Officer Stilinski, I’ve got a multiple GSW, I need a lifeline pull-out right away.” 

He listens as the operator locates his phone and tells him that they have a full team already sixty seconds out. 

Scott stares at him in abject revulsion. 

Stiles moves Derek out of the way and takes over compressions, counting under his breath. Allison pulls up with everyone else in her car; they’re all stable for the moment. 

“You need to get out of here,” Allison says, “Kate called it in to the cops when she realized that her plan to kill everyone didn’t work.”

“You’ve got forty seconds,” Stiles includes. “A team’s on the way.”

“I’m not leaving Isaac,” Scott protests.

“Scott, please!” Allison says trying to pull him away. 

“I’ll take care of him, Scott. I promise. Go!” Stiles says, never for a moment taking his focus off keeping his compressions properly timed. 

Scott looks up as he hears the sirens from the distance. He glances one more time at Stiles, but then runs for the car. 

Derek follows without a backwards glance towards Stiles. 

The car leaves with seconds to spare, but the cops pull over to help Stiles with the GSW. Stiles breathes a sigh of relief, knowing that for now, everyone’s safe. 

\--

Stiles is sitting across from his dad in his office like they have been for the past three hours. His hand is wrapped, but he knows he’s going to need stitches if it has any chance of healing properly. 

It’s been a very unproductive conversation, but Stiles hasn’t felt inspired to throw his dad many bones. He knows if he were anyone else, he wouldn’t get away with this, but thankfully, he’s still the Sheriff’s son. 

“You’re telling me that they weren’t involved,” John says disbelieving. 

“I’m telling you that I don’t know anything.”

“Stiles, you were at the scene of the crime. Lahey was the GSW we had to save. We saw their cars driving away.” John slams his hands down on the table exasperatedly. 

Stiles says nothing and keeps his gaze fixed on the desk. 

“You’re about two minutes away from an obstruction of justice charge.” John watches Stiles carefully, but whatever he finds isn’t what he was expecting. “What’s going on?”

“I know things got complicated, son, but if they were killing people. If Hale was killing people…”

“They weren’t the ones killing people!” Stiles protests. 

“But they were the ones hijacking.”

Stiles’ silence speaks volumes. 

“I knew I should’ve pulled you out. They’re criminals, Stiles. Scott, Derek, they’re all criminals.”

“Doesn’t change the fact that I’m in love with him.” 

John flops down into his seat and falls completely silent. Stiles can feel his resolution building with every passing moment. He did a lot of questionable shit growing up himself. 

“Dad, Kate Argent has been trying to take them out for months, and yes, they may be the ones who do the stealing, but they’re not killing people. I’m not going to let you destroy them.”

“You’re not going to let me?” 

“No,” Stiles says firmly. “Not when they’re not the real issue. Kate is. The whole reason they had to start this in the first place was to pay off Derek’s medical bills from when Kate tried to kill him.”

“Stiles, that doesn’t make it right.”

“But it’s a different story when I get away with crime because you’re my dad. How many charges did you get dropped for me in high school?” 

The Sheriff lays his head on his hands and doesn’t respond for awhile, giving Stiles a very long time to have his guilt build for how much he’s killing his father. It doesn’t change the fact that he can’t be the reason for destroying the people who have become his family too. 

“Stiles,” John begins reluctantly, “my hands are tied.”

“Then fucking untie-“ 

Stiles’ diatribe is interrupted by Braeden marching through the Sheriff’s door.

“You two are way too fucking loud, but thankfully, I have the proof Stiles needs.”

Braeden sets a file in front of the Sheriff. 

“What?” Stiles asks confused.

“You weren’t the only one undercover, Stiles.” Braeden rolls her eyes. 

“U.S. Marshal,” she explains bluntly. 

Stiles lets his dad read the file while trying to keep the hope from building yet. 

John looks up after his finished. “So, you’re telling me that the only way to take down Kate Argent, who is responsible for every hijacking murder as well as the new heroin outpost, is with Hale and McCall’s help.” 

Braeden nods and smirks. Stiles can’t tell if that smirk is because she knows they don’t need them or if it’s because she knows Stiles will do whatever she wants from this point on. 

“I think full immunity will be the only way to get them to help. Don’t you, Stiles?” Braeden replies with an arrogant grin. 

Stiles nods enthusiastically. 

“She’ll target them, and we’ll be there to catch her,” Stiles adds.

John heaves a long-suffering sigh and says, “Fine.” 

Stiles doesn’t think he can be blamed for fist pumping. 

\--

Stiles parks his car at the end of the driveway of Scott’s house as Derek’s walking to his car with his shotgun. 

“Derek,” Stiles starts, but Derek doesn’t even stop to look at him. 

“Move your car,” Derek says. 

“Don’t do this,” Stiles implores.

“I need to find Liam before she does! We’re all he has and she’s going to kill him.” 

“I’ll call him in, have the cops pick him up before Kate can get to him.”

Stiles tries to move closer to Derek, but Derek glowers at him until he stops. 

“You are the fucking cops, Stiles. You’re a cop!” 

Scott walks out of the house. 

“Stiles, get out of the way,” Scott says. 

“I will help you take her down, just not like this.”

“Why so we’ll only go to prison for fifteen years instead of twenty,” Scott spits.

Stiles recoils a bit over Scott’s ferocity; he’s never seen him like this before, but he knows he deserves all of it. 

“No,” Stiles replies, “if we-“ 

He’s cut off by a car coming down the street. They all look up to watch Liam approach. 

He’s immediately out of his car and walking towards them. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know what to do.” 

Scott sighs in relief and walks towards Liam. 

Stiles and Derek both whip their heads around at the sound of a motorcycle. 

Kate drives past and shoots across the entire yard, connecting with Liam’s body. 

Scott runs towards Liam even as the bullet stream continues. Kate finally passes them, and Scott catches Liam as he falls. 

“Liam!” Scott cries out. 

“It’s not that bad,” Liam breathes out even as he’s clearly in pain. 

He’s only got one wound on his shoulder and Scott immediately puts pressure on it. 

Stiles hops in his car to follow Kate, and Derek quickly follows. 

They chase Kate as she weaves through the LA traffic. Stiles loses sight of where Derek is behind him. He runs several red lights and hears cars crash in his wake, but he focuses on keeping Kate in his sight. 

He thinks he has her trapped when she slides her motorcycle under a semi, and he’s stuck on the other side.

The semi finally pulls through the intersection and Stiles watches as Derek cuts around a corner and swings the back-end of the Camaro into Kate. She flies off the bike and into the air and lands with a sickening crunch. 

Stiles pulls up, but before he can exit his car Braeden is there with her gun pulled on Derek who has his gun trained on Kate’s head. 

“Do it,” Kate says as she spits out blood. 

“Don’t,” Braeden warns, clicking off her safety.

“Derek!” Stiles yells, “put the gun down! You don’t need to do this.”

“She’s destroyed too much.”

“I enjoyed it too,” Kate taunts. 

Stiles hurries to put himself between Derek and Kate so he doesn’t have a chance to take the kill shot. 

“Derek, you don’t need to do this. Let us arrest her.”

“Why should I?”

“Because I got you immunity in exchange. Everyone goes free.”

Braeden coughs pointedly. “Well, Braeden helped with that too.” She rolls her eyes at him. 

Derek finally takes his eyes away from Kate and meets Stiles’ gaze. His expression flickers so quickly, Stiles can’t place the emotions. Derek slowly nods, pockets his gun, and walks away. 

\--

Stiles is thoroughly exhausted by the several previous days. They arrested Kate, but then he had to deal with all the fall-out from his choices. He just wants to sleep for the next month, but he can’t. Not until he talks to Derek at least one last time. 

He walks into the garage and Derek doesn’t even look up. 

“You’ve got balls being here.”

Stiles shrugs. 

“How are Isaac and Liam?”

Derek finally looks up from his book to stare at Stiles. “Alive and improving. Isaac’s pissed that you were the one that saved him.”

Stiles laughs at that and sits down at the counter. 

“What are you doing here, Stiles?” Derek asks. 

“I quit the force.”

Derek shrugs like it doesn’t matter to him. It doesn’t really matter to Stiles either, but he realized he was tired of being forced to use the law when the situations were so much more complicated than that.

His life doesn’t exist in black and white and it never will. 

“That’s not an answer as to why you’re here.”

“I owed you a car,” Stiles points out as he gestures behind him towards the car sitting in the street. Stiles watches as Derek has to fight back a smirk. 

“And I missed your tuna sandwiches,” Stiles continues. 

“No, you didn’t,” Derek retorts. 

“No, I really didn’t.” Stiles takes a deep breath. “But I did miss you.”

Derek doesn’t say anything, but he does walk around the counter so he can get a better look at the car. 

“What do you say, finally down for our rematch?” Stiles asks. His fingers won’t stop drumming against the counter with his nerves. 

“You’re never going to win,” Derek taunts.

“And if I do? You go on a date with me.” 

“And what if I win?” Derek asks. 

Stiles shrugs. “Whatever you want. You want me to leave forever, okay. You want me to stay forever, okay.” 

Derek walks away without responding and heads out the back door. Stiles stands there awkwardly for a moment before he realizes that that was probably the end. He pretends he isn’t crushed. 

The Camaro pulls up in front of the garage. 

“I thought we were racing,” Derek calls out. 

Stiles beams and hops into his car. He pulls up next to Derek at the light. 

“Go on green. First one to the park. Straight shot,” Derek says. 

“You’re on,” Stiles replies with a thumbs up. 

He keeps his eyes firmly focused on the light, but he allows himself one last glance at Derek who’s looking straight back at him. He thinks they might be okay. He’s in love with Derek, he’s not ready to give that up. 

The light turns green.


End file.
